Carrie 3: Shadows of the Past
by bloodrosered
Summary: Becky White, the disturbed sister of Carrie, is interviewed as of what happened on Black Prom Night. Rated M for strong violence,language,scenes of nudity and sexuality,and mature themes concerning teen pranks and dysfunctinal family relationships
1. Part 1: Chapter 1

CARRIE 3: Shadows Of the Past

NOTE: so you're not confused. ( ) is Becky's thoughts. ( ) with italicized words is Carrie's thoughts and voice, and ( ) in bold are Momma's voice and thoughts.

PART I: BLOOD SPORT AND PLAYING WITH FIRE

_Prologue_

From_ The Medical Files of Rebecca White _from Chamberlain County Psychiatric Primary doctor: Henry Bell (p. 10)

The bars on the window cast a shadow on the white tile floors from the sun. There is a smell of sterility, body odor, piss, shit, and dust. There are sounds coming from the TV and calming classical music from the radio echoing through the white halls, the shuffling of feet on the white tile floor and bodies in hard beds, the clomping of high-heels from nurses, heavy footsteps from doctors and the squeaks of wheels from partitions and gurneys. There are straightjackets, muzzles and booties hanging on the wall and leather straps on beds, and a room with padded walls with triple locks on the outside of the door, but no handle on the inside.

All this that is described here you can find in Chamberlain County Psychiatric Hospital, just about three blocks away from the park, which is another two blocks from Carlin Street. Everything here at Chamberlain Psychiatric is barbwire and fence on the outside; but on the inside, it's sterilized, white, and occasionally quiet if there isn't a patient causing commotion. Then, nurses would come in with a sedative and a straightjacket, strap them down in the white jacket and inject the sedative into them until they passed out.

A girl's pale thin face reflects off the glass of the window, her bony pale fingers entwining and gripping the bars on the window, her breath fogs the glass, her black sunken-in eyes stare out the window through her unkempt hair, watching the people outside and inside the barb-wire fence with vigilance.

It was indeed a beautiful day outside. The sun was shining, the flowers were in bloom, children were playing outside, people were walking outside…even the patients of Chamberlain Psychiatric were outside, playing sports, talking to each other, and smoking.

(oh, yes, the sun is shining indeed…just not for me. with the voices and the images in my head that keep me awake, being a patient with post-traumatic stress syndrome. that's why the sun ain't shining for me…)

Her body trembling, eyes aching from holding back her tears, her lip trembling. Blood hot, veins pulsing in her temples, and heart beating hard against her sternum and her fingers grip tighter on the bars.Soon, she falls to her knees, crying bitterly while her fingers still grip the bars.

"Why? Why did I leave you alone?" she whispered, "it's all my fault that you're dead!"

(_No, it's not, Beck_,)a voice replied in the darkness of her head.

"Yes, it is, Carrie!" (No, Beck! you just didn't know…) 

"I did! I should've known what was going to happen!"

(Beck, it's not your fault!) 

"Why did I do it, Car? Why? I knew Momma was going to kill you. I tried to stop her, I tried!"

(_I know you would've, Beck 'cause you're a good sister_.)

"I love you, Carrie."

(_I love you too, Beck. We'll stay together…_)

"Forever and ever, here in your world…"

Another voice came in. One of an older woman.

(**sin never dies, rebecca**)

"Bitch," she whispered. "You can stop your bullshit."

(**sin never dies, rebecca. even in one's past, present…and future**)

"Bitch," she said again. "You have no future. You never had a future."

After this, she giggled…

(_good girl, becky. Tell her_.)

"She's a bitch, isn't she, Carrie? She's always been one. She was born a bitch, she died a bitch and she is burning in Hell, sleeping in Satan's bed, fucking him…"

Becky burst into peals of laughter. The young girl's voice laughed too.

"Becky?" said a voice behind her.

Becky turned her head from the window. It was a nurse, holding a wheeled veiled screen.

"What's so funny?" asked the nurse.

"Nothing," she said. "Something I said. Carrie thought it was funny."

"Who's Carrie?" The nurse raised her eyebrows.

"She's my friend."

"Where is she?"

"She lives in my head…I talk to her sometimes…I tell her everything."

"And who's a bitch?"

"Bitch?" said Becky, clueless at first. "Oh yea! The Bitch. The Bitch who birthed Carrie and I. Yea…I know who you're talking about. Yea…she's in Hell, fucking Satan…sucking his cock and…"

"OK, Becky," the nurse said. "You told me this yesterday. I'll have none of that foul talk from you, young lady. You understand?"

Becky just giggled. "You wanna know how I know? 'Cause Carrie told me. She shows me everything. Anyway, why have you come to interrupt our conversation? You know I'm a busy girl."

"Well, I'm sorry to bother you, Becky, but you have a visitor who want to ask you some questions. Please come with me."

"Send them away," Becky said, quietly. "I don't want any visitors."

"They insist, Becky. They say it's about your sister."

Becky sighed and followed.

Chapter I

From _Interview with Rebecca A. White _(p. 12) The White Commission. Written by Detective John Mulchaey.

CHAMBERLAIN COUNTY PSYCHIATRIC

I walked into Visiting Room 4; it was small with a single table and two chairs with a large glass window and a single telephone. The nurse turned toward me.

"Rebecca will be coming shortly. But, I must warn you, Rebecca has been diagnosed with severe post-traumatic stress syndrome and schizophrenia. She can act a bit, you know, funny. If she gets too out-of-hand, we'll have a straightjacket and the Thorzine ready."

"I will," I replied. "Thank you."

I had interviewed Susan Snell, the only survivor of Black Prom Night, last week. She had told me all about this Rebecca White, the only survivor of the White family. I was unable to locate the father of the White girls. Rumor had it he was living with another woman, but no one had seen him in Chamberlain. Carrie and Margaret White were dead. I had read the report about Rebecca A. White, Carrietta N. White's younger sister.

"The day Rebecca White dies, Chamberlain County will declare that a national holiday," Sue told me that's what everyone said.

"Why would they say that?" I asked.

"Everyone hated Rebecca, not as much as Carrie. Becky was mean as a pit bull and as mad as a March Hare. You bother her, she'll yell obscenities and insults to you. You bother her sister, she'll rip your face off," Sue said. "She almost killed Chris Hargensen one time in a cat fight."

Sue told me her last place of residence was Chamberlain County Psychiatric, claiming Becky kept hearing voices of the dead speaking to her and having dreams of Prom Night repeatedly.

I couldn't wait to meet this Rebecca.

Outside the door, there were squeaks of wheels; a large veiled screen that was being pulled by a nurse toward the visiting room. Behind it was a shadow of a girl, walking behind it. Soon, the door opened slowly and the nurse guided the girl inside. There, standing in the doorway, was Rebecca White, herself. I was very surprised to see this girl myself; because of her appearance, she was more creature than human; by every second that went by, she seemed to be dying.

She was about sixteen years old, yet seemed hardly fourteen. She was extremely pale and thin. It appeared that her sanity was barely hanging by a thread. She had black eyes, large and sunken in shadow, making her seem so melancholic, frightened, and sickly; they gazed downward, avoiding eye contact. The mouth was very thin, pale and dry, seeming to have never smiled in years, expressing prolonged silence. Her hair was a dull mousy color, yet it was very unkempt and hung miserably over her face. One portion of her hair was drawn back, revealing her right ear, which had multiple punctures, suggesting multiple piercing; her earrings were missing and the holes were closing up.

She wore a sad green woolen robe and a pair of dirty gray pajamas, both rumpled like she had slept in them; the front was open just above her breasts, showing the deep hollows of her neck and her pale bosom. The sleeves of her robe covered her pale hands, which were smooth, yet freckled with very thin fingers and shortly cut clean fingernails. On the milky neck was a sad silver chain cascading into her pajamas. Her feet were bare, pale and freckled.

Becky soon stared at me and slowly sat down. Then, she stared at the table. She had placed both feet on the cold floor and folded her hands and rolled up the sleeves of her robe, revealing a medical bracelet on the right wrist and a tattoo on her left wrist that said, BECKY.

I set up the tape recorder on the table, along with a plastic water bottle and a box of fresh hot sugar-glazed donuts. I plugged it in and then pressed the red record button. Becky watched. The tape began to roll.

"Rebecca White?" I said. Then, seeing the tattoo, I corrected myself, "Or is it 'Becky' you like to be called?"

The girl didn't answer. She merely looked at me and then, stared back at the table.

"Becky," I began. "I'm Detective John Mulchaey."

Still nothing from her.

I looked at the box of donuts, smiling, I pushed tehm in front of her, saying in a nice, sweet voice: "Say, would you like a donut? They're fresh hot." Silence. "They're sugar-glazed. I know they're your favorite. Nurse Betty told me."

She reached over to the box slowly, avoiding eye contact. She mouthed something to me, but I guess it was a 'thank you'.

"Delicious, aren't they?"

She made an inclination of her head. I watched as she took big bites, wiping the sugar glaze from her lips and licking her fingers like a hungry beast.

"Anyway, I'm working on the Carrie White case. I'm here to ask you some questions about what happened two weeks ago. We found that two people from Black Prom Night were survivors of the fire: Susan Snell and you. We questioned Miss Snell already, who told us about you and where we could find you. First off," I pushed a photograph in front of Becky. It was a photo a girl about sixteen, pale, eyes closed, hair drawn behind her neck, lying naked on the autopsy table. "Do you recognize this girl?"

Becky merely stopped eating her donut and stared at the photograph, transfixed. Then, she reached out her left hand and touched the photograph, getting sugar-glazed fingerprints on the photo.

"Hey, sticky fingers," I said. "Careful."

She moved her hand away and I saw another tattoo on her wrist, which said, CARRIE.

"So, is Carrie your sister?"

Becky was still silent; eyes still cast downward and not moving.

"Becky, you need to answer my questions," I said. "It's the only way we can investigate about what happened to your sister. We could arrest you and hold you a suspect for the murder of your sister and mother."

Becky's black eyes looked at me, giving me shivers up my spine. Then, her thin mouth opened slowly, revealing some white teeth and her voice creaked softly.

"And what would I get for that?" she spoke. Her voice was soft and she barely spoke in a whisper.

"Double homicide is a class-A felony, which is a life-sentence, no possibility for parole, and possibly the death penalty. We can't make a deal if you keep your mouth shut, Becky. And prison is nasty place for nice young girls like you."

She let out a sigh. I could tell she'd rather rot in peace in the psychiatric hospital rather than prison.

"No…we're more than just sisters, we're soul sisters."

"What's the difference?" I asked.

"Soul sisters," Becky answered, still quietly. "Understand each other and stay together forever."

"We found your sister in the kitchen closet of the wreckage, stabbed in the back. We also found your mother in there too." I pushed the other photo of a woman about thirty or so, naked on the autopsy table with her hair pulled back. "She was stabbed multiple times in the…"

"That wasn't the cause of her death," said Becky, interrupting.

"What do you mean? The coroner said that…"

"She didn't die from that." Her voice sounded irritated.

Suddenly, I noticed that the room felt much warmer than before: the water in the bottle started to simmer and bubble a bit and there was fog on the plastic like it was on a heater. It didn't seem natural at all. I shook it off, thinking it must be the lights in here making me see things.

"Then, what did she die of?" I asked.

Becky calmed down…the room cooled again, reached inside her dirty pajamas with grubby bony fingers and pulled out a sad looking crucifix on a link chain.

"Religion," she whispered between her teeth, "is the poison of society: too much will kill."

I stared with disbelief at Becky. Shivers went up my spine, the hairs on my neck and arms were stiff bristles…and I realized I had an erection; it pressed painfully against the zipper of my pants. I shifted uncomfortably in the chair, crossing my legs, trying to bend my penis back into place. Just like that, Becky started giggling. This giggle sounded like a giggle of a schoolgirl giggle, yet with a touch of evil.

"Scared?" she said, smiling.

I didn't like this. I felt uncomfortable in this very room with this girl.

"I noticed the hair on the back of your hand is standing up," she said. "And your dick is pressing against your pants, isn't it? Uncomfy, are we?" Again, she giggled. "I know all about what happens when people get scared. Hair stands up, heart pumps faster, veins and arteries pulse in the neck or temple, body starts trembling: from the inside out, your skin crawling. For girls, the muscles in the vagina pulse involuntarily and for guys, they get an erection."

"That's very interesting," I said, trying to calm down. "Now, let's stay on subject. Now, do you remember what happened that night, on Prom Night? The night your sister died?"

Becky stared at the table again, silent and still.

"Becky, please," said Joan. "I need to know."

"And you will…" she said quietly, staring at them with her black eyes.

The tape kept rolling, recording events in Becky's own words of what happened…


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter II

From_ Carrie and Becky: The Black Dawn of TK and Pyrokinesis_ by Jack Garner (Esquire Magazine, September 1980)

Margaret White bore her eldest, Carrietta, on September 21, 1963. A year later, she bore her youngest, Rebecca, on March 15th. Their father, Ralph White, left Margaret, due to her near-fanatical religious beliefs; he was sick and tired of coming home and hearing how the world around him was a sin and her damning everyone to Hell. He left her with another woman. Momma screamed at Ralph down Carlin Street, swollen with child, damning him and his whore to hell as they walked down the street while Ralph screamed obscenities over his shoulder.

Carrie, only one and too young to understand, and Mrs. White, pregnant, continued to live alone in a Chamberlain bungalow. And because of her fanatical belief, Mrs. White had no friends to help her through this time of grief.

At 11:50 PM, the neighbors on Carlin Street began to hear screams from the White bungalow. But they didn't call the police because they either did not want to be involved with an investigation or they had a strong dislike for Mrs. White. By midnight, the police had come to see what the screaming was about. They found Mrs. White in bed, the sheets drenched with blood and a butcher knife on the floor. It was only when they saw the baby at Mrs. White's breast, her engorged nipple in its mouth while it suckled hungrily. She had cut the umbilical cord herself. The little girl was called 'Rebecca Anne'.

When the girl was born, about a month premature, terribly small, ugly, sickly with such strange eyes. Rather than blue, the color of all babies when they are born, they were ebony black. Mrs. White screamed in terror when she saw the baby's eyes open for the first time, calling her a 'sickly, ugly baby with Satan's eyes'.

But her sister, Carrie, fell immediately in love with her new sister. She raised sickly, ugly little Becky: fed her a bottle, bathed her, walked her to the park, dressed her, changed her diapers, and taught her to walk and talk. Becky became quite attached to her older sister, following her around, her pale legs tottering, crying:

"Cawwie! Cawwie!"

At one, strange things began to happen…too strange that it seemed unexplainable. Whenever bottles came late or she didn't have a certain toy she wanted, the temperature seemed to increase like a heat wave in January. Carrie couldn't understand why this seemed to happen. When it was Becky's naptime, Carrie couldn't find Becky's favorite doll to sleep with and replaced it with another doll. When Carrie went to check on her, she found the doll in flames!

"Cawwie!" screamed little Becky. "Where's my dolly?"

"Becky, no! Don't play with fire! That's a no!" She grabbed the doll and put it out with some water in a vase.

"I didn't play with fire! It appeared!"

Carrie stopped putting out the doll, shocked to hear this from her sister's own lips, not knowing how to respond to such a thing.

"What?"

"It appeared."

"How?"

"I don't know."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know. It just appeared."

Carrie still didn't understand how a doll just out-of-the-ordinary burst into flames. She scolded Becky that playing with fire was still dangerous.

It happened another time when Becky wanted a hug from Momma. Becky jumped up, tugging on her dress, straining her arms upward, begging Momma (in the kitchen, cooking) to hug her, whining.

"Up, Momma! Up, Momma!" whined little Becky, jumping up and down. "Up, up, up!"

"Not now, Rebecca," said Momma, pushing her away.

The girl screamed and cried and the heat jumped five degrees from normal. The sweat began to form, glittering like little diamonds.

"UP, MOMMA!" she screamed loudly and suddenly…Momma screamed. Her oven mittens burst into yellow orange flames about one foot high. Momma went to put her mittens out in the sink; soft gray smoke rose from her charred mittens and her smooth skin was red from the heat.

"Didn't do it," she sobbed.

"Of course you didn't do it, Rebecca," said Momma. "It must've had my hands too close to the stove."

What caused the unexpected fires to occur?

The fires remained dormant for three years…

Three-year-old Becky, very small, about two inches shorter than Carrie and terribly thin that her body was delicate china; if one tipped her over, she would smash into a billion pieces. Her eyes were large, glassy and black like a doll's that seemed to stare blankly with a pale face with soft dull mousy locks hanging over the face, which seemed to express melancholy, sickness, and fear. The mouth was thin and had a vacant, melancholic expression, which never seemed to smile. Just to look at this one child of misery could make a strong and a mean person fall weak at the knees and weep for this child.

Carrie and Becky were the best pair of sisters anyone had ever seen. They were absolutely inseparable even though the girls were different: Carrie, quiet, calm, and obedient whereas Becky was loud, rebellious, and stubborn and liked to wander a lot.

On a warm spring day, while the girls, Carrie was four and Becky was three, were in the back yard, Carrie in a yellow dress and Becky in a blue dress that came to the shins. Becky whistled Bernard Hermann's 'Twisted Nerve' while pulling the tops off of dandelions and daisies while Carrie watched her, holding her lamb. Momma said that Carrie had to watch Becky at all times and make sure she didn't wander off.

Becky turned her head to next-door and saw their sixteen-year-old neighbor, Stella Horan in a lawn chair in a white bikini. She stopped whistling and moved closer to the fence.

"Becky," called Carrie. "Where are you going?"

"I want to see that lady over there," said Becky, pointing her little pale finger.

"Becky, no! Momma said we're not allowed!" Carrie ran towards her sister, who ignored her completely, grabbed her hand and followed her.

Once they got the picket fence that separated the two neighbors, Becky pushed a loose board and wandered to the neighbor's yard with Carrie following behind. They stopped in front of napping Stella and stared at her, who was napping in the yard out in the sun in her bikini. Her bosom was completely bare, her top tossed aside, lying on her stomach, napping. Carrie and Becky stared with full curiosity. Soon, Stella woke up and saw the two little girls staring at her, dressed in yellow and green dresses that were too long for this type of weather.

"Hello, girls," Stella said, smiling.

Neither Carrie nor Becky responded.

"What are those?" Carrie said suddenly, pointing to Stella's breasts.

"They're her titties, Carrie," said Becky. "It's where babies suckle milk from their mommas. Also, boys like to suckle on them too when they're making love to a girl."

Stella could barely answer when she heard what came out of this child's mouth: so full of knowledge, yet so obscene. Something she would never hear from a child brought up religiously.

"Your sister is right, Carrie. They're my breasts," said Stella, covering her bosom with her arms. To Becky, she said, surprised, "Where did you hear such things like that Becky?"

"I dunno," was her only response, shrugging her tiny shoulders. "I just do."

Stella shrugged it off, assuming that this is what being brought up religiously did to people. It turned nice people into crazy, obscene drug-and-sex addicts.

"I wish I had some," said Carrie.

"Me too," said Becky.

"You will, girls. You just have to wait. You won't get them for another…oh, eight or nine years."

"No. Momma says good girls don't get them," Carrie replied.

"Well, I'm a good girl and I have them. Doesn't your mother have breasts?"

Carrie lowered her head and said something very quietly.

"I'm sorry, but what did you say?" Stella asked.

"She said," Becky said. "'Momma had been bad and when she made Carrie and me and that's why she has the dirty pillows." Becky said.

"What are 'dirty pillows'?" Stella asked, confused; she had never heard such a word.

"What Momma calls 'tits'. Besides, lady, our momma's full of bullshit anyway."

"Becky!" screeched Carrie. "You swore! You're supposed to be a good girl! Momma will be mad at you!"

"I don't care!" Becky screamed, stubbornly. Her face was as tomato red, sweat dripped down her forehead, and her tiny fists were clenched as if she were going to explode and her mouth turned into a stubborn pout. "I'm TIRED of being a good girl!"

Suddenly, there was a slight change in the temperature outside…it felt as if there were a huge heat wave. But it was only early summer…the temperature was supposed in the sixties and seventies, as it was heard on the radio; yet strangely the thermometer outside read ninety degrees.

"Calm down, Becky!" said Carrie, seeing her sister getting very angry.

Stella's mother, Mrs. Horan came out and saw the two girls.

"Oh, hello, girls," she said, smiling sweetly.

The girls just nodded.

"Why don't you girls come on in and have some lemonade?" said Mrs. Horan. "You look awfully hot in those dresses."

"Why…" Becky began, smiling brightly. No one had ever asked such a thing.

"No!" Carrie interrupted. To Mrs. Horan, "Um…no, thank you, ma'am. We can't."

"But why not?" Becky whined. "That was awful nice of her."

"We can't, Becky…"

"This _sucks_! I want some lemonade. I'm hot as fuckin' hell."

Again, the heat increased to eighty. Beads of sweat began to form on Becky's tiny body: her forehead, the back of her neck, her clenched fists, her underarms, knee backs, and between her legs.

"Becky!"

Soon, Momma came out of the house…really angry that the girls had left the back yard. Her face was fire truck red, her hands were tightened into fists, her face like a gargoyle's that one would think she was having a stroke and she screeched loudly to the holy heavens:

"CAAAARRRIEEEEEE! BEEEECKKYYYYYY!"

The girls' faces turned a cottage cheese color.

"Don't yell at them that way!" screamed Stella. "They didn't do anything wrong!"

"Don't tell me what to do, whore-girl," Momma said.

"Suck it, you cow!" said Stella.

"Stella!" said Mrs. Horan, shocked at such language.

"Carrie and Becky! Get inside right now!" Momma said, sternly. The girls went back over to their house. Momma pulled the girls inside with a death grip on their wrists. They began to cry.

Once inside, she screamed at the girls insanely and telling them to get themselves to closet and pray for forgiveness while the little girls were screaming and crying, telling her that they were sorry, they forgot.

"Get to your closet and pray, girls!"

"I don't want to!" screamed the girls, simultaneously.

Becky could feel it in her veins; hot and pulsing hard inside…the little power inside her that had been dormant for three years had awoken. The room became hot, about 100 degrees; her temples were sweaty and eyes were glittering angrily; yet her face was calm. The windows open and shut repeatedly.

(play with fire and you will burn…)

Carrie was standing next to her. They were sobbing while Momma forced them to kneel to pray. Soon, the windows stopped flapping open and shut. The White house was soon quiet...then, a table flew out the window…the surface was on fire. There was the sound of pelting against the roof…there were stones, the size of softballs. It soon turned into a shower. 

"Not the closet! No, Momma! Please!" the girls screamed and sobbed.

Momma fell to her knees and screamed as the stones pelted loudly. The heat in White bungalow intensified to about 200. Becky was sweating from her tight fists that it dripped on the floor. The water in the sink began to boil and the floorboards began to smoke.

"Stop it, girls! Stop it now!"

(push) 

Soon, some of the stones began to smoke that landed in the yard; they felt heavy and hot.

(push harder, push…push harder, PUSH…!) 

Then, a stone that hit the ground burst into flames about six feet high. The stones turned into fireballs that exploded about six feet high, maybe higher. The grass ignited and burst into yellow flames grey smoke. Some hit the roof and the porch.

"Stop it! Stop doing that!"

Momma screamed with terror. The flames roared loudly, attracting attention from all the neighbors…seeing that the White's lawn was on fire. It looked like something between Armageddon and the fiery hail from the ten plagues of Egypt.

From Westover (Me.) weekly _Enterprise_, August 19, 1966:

Rain of Fiery Stones Reported

It was reliably reported by several persons that a rain of fiery stones fell from the clear blue sky on Carlin Street in the town of Chamberlain on August 17th. The stones principally fell on the home of Mrs. Margaret White, damaging the roof extensively, ruining two gutters, a downspout and burning the lawn charred black at the cost of $25. Mrs. White, a widow, lives with her four-year-old daughter, Carrietta, and her three-year-old daughter, Rebecca.

Mrs. White couldn't be reached for comment.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter III  
  
From The Shadow and Flame Exploded (p. 10)  
  
Carrie and Becky had gone to school with the same people since the first grade (or in Becky's case, kindergarten) in accordance of the laws that govern human nature and physics, built steadily with the chain reaction of critical mass.  
  
Yet nobody knew that Carrie was telekinetic and Becky was telepathic, clairvoyant and her most dangerous talent, her ability to light fires and create heat: pyrokinesis.  
  
Graffiti scratched on a desk at Barker Street Grammar School in Chamberlain:  
  
Carrie and Becky White eat shit  
  
Beneath that was scratched:  
  
Your Daddy shat you from his asshole, fuckface!  
  
Next the exclamation point was a black charred spot.  
  
~  
  
"Nobody understood us," said Becky quietly. "They didn't understand what it was like to live with a theomaniacal mother who forced you to do everything you didn't want to."  
  
"Is that why you and Carrie were both targets of being made fun of?" asked Mike.  
  
"Not me, in particular. It was mostly Carrie that was the target that those hens pecked at. Nobody wanted to piss me off because someone would get hurt..."  
  
~  
  
"Come on, ladies," shouted Miss Collins, their slim, non-breasted gym teacher. "Move your bodies."  
  
The girls were all dressed in their gym clothes, playing volleyball. The volleyball zipped from girl to girl. Becky wiped the sweat from her pale forehead, moved her long hair aside. Ball was now on the opposite side.  
  
(she's gonna miss it I know it)  
  
"Hit it to Carrie!" said the girl on the opposite side. "She'll blow it."  
  
Becky watched, knowing she was going to miss it.  
  
"Come on, hit it, Carrie!" said Sue Snell, the brunette with blue eyes.  
  
The ball came towards Carrie, her face full of fear and she dumbly swung at the ball with her hand, attempting to hit it, but unfortunately, she did indeed miss the ball.  
  
"Aw, Carrie!" groaned her teammates. Carrie stood there, blushing.  
  
"Gym class is over, shower up, ladies," said Miss Collins.  
  
The girls hissed and sneered at her. "Why did we have to have her on the team?" said Norma Watson. She hit her on the head with her hat.  
  
"Look at her!"  
  
"You eat shit!" Chris Hargensen hissed at her in her ear.  
  
Becky ran towards Chris like a bolt of lightning, and shoved her down hard. She shrieked as she was pushed and scraped her knee and red liquid seeped through the scrape. Becky smiled, satisfied that Chris was hurt.  
  
"OW!" she screeched. "Jesus, Becky! What's your problem?"  
  
"If you bother my sister again, you dirty fucking pussy cunt," she warned; her voice angry and the heat intensifying, "you lose a fucking ovary. Dig?" She cracked her knuckles.  
  
"All right, Becky," said Miss Collins. "Don't start anything."  
  
Soon, the locker room was filled with shouts and echoed off the tiles. The girls had just finished playing volleyball in Period One gym class and the girls were covered in sweat and they all headed for the showers.  
  
Girls stood under the hot water, squalling, flicking water, and passing white bars of soap from hand to hand. Showers turning off one by one, naked girls stepping out, removing bathing caps, running, grabbing towels, spraying deodorant, pulling on and throwing their clothes around, brushing hair, bras hooked and panties slipped into. Laughs, shrieks, and loud talking and steam hung in the air, resembling a Roman bathhouse.  
  
Becky and Carrie stood among them stolidly, one a frog and the other a sickly wretch among princesses. Carrie was sixteen, had pimples on her face, neck, back and butt, and freckles everywhere from head to toe, and her wet hair was blonde, yet it seemed to have no color, and her eyes were sky blue, making them seem glassy and her nose was pointed. The unmade face expressed naivety and vacancy as the thin mouth that expressed silence. The breasts were full with coffee colored nipples.  
  
Becky was nearly fifteen, yet hardly seemed thirteen being diminutive in height and her appearance: very thin, melancholic, and sickly. There were dark shadows beneath the eyes and hollows in her neck that one would only see in sick, dying, or abused persons. Smiling always made one show how beautiful your teeth are, but she never smiled; the mouth only expressed silence and sadness. Her wet hair was a dull mousy color, hanging in her face and her skin color was pale as if she had never been outside. Her hands were small and childlike with sharp, clean fingernails. She had small breasts, yet she wore a bra, but it was too big on her that she seemed to have none at all.  
  
But her eyes...oh those eyes! What horror they brought you when you stared into them: black, glassy eyes like a doll's, staring...just looking at her, it made you think she knew everything inside your soul, bringing cold chills up your spine, the hair on your neck stand on end, and your stomach turn with sick nervousness.  
  
Becky stepped out of the shower, drying her thin body; her sleek legs covered with shaving scars. She pulled on her heavy cotton panties and her bra (size A). She pulled on a long black skirt coming to her calves that were covered in razor scars from shaving.  
  
"Hello, Beck-kee," said Chris Hargensen's nasty voice behind her. She turned to find Chris was naked; her breasts sagged like an old woman's. Becky didn't answer.  
  
"I see you haven't been able to fit in a bra yet. Might I suggest band- aids?" she laughed.  
  
Christine Hargensen was blonde with pretty green eyes and pretty lips. She pecked at any misfit in the school, along with her friends.  
  
(at least I don't have floppy titties like yours)  
  
She and her bitch friends: Sue Snell, Alice Blake, Katie Spies, Helen Shryes, Donna Thibodeau, and her sister, Mary Lila Grace, and Norma Watson all laughed and pointed at Becky's small breasts in her oversized bra.  
  
"If you ask me, Chris," said Becky, feigning a bright smile as if taking the insult as a compliment. "I think you'd be a lot nicer if your Momma hadn't shit you out of her asshole rather than her pussy when you were born."  
  
The girls stopped laughing and looked at her in shock.  
  
"Plus," Becky added. "At least no one has sucked my titties until they were floppy like an old lady's."  
  
The girls looked shocked; for Becky had the worst insults in her mind. Oh yes! Becky was sick, sick in mind. Anything she said could make a Christian's stomach turn in sickness. Her thoughts were horrible, her words vile, and her insults were obscene. Chris's face turned fire engine red.  
  
"Then your mother eats shit," said Chris. "And no one sucked my tits!"  
  
"If my Momma eats shit, then your Momma is a whore. There's a lot of thing that I know that you don't know, like she fucked every guy in high school."  
  
"She did not!" Chris shrieked.  
  
"Oh, yes. She did. Then, she met your daddy, spread her skimpy little legs and fucked your Daddy in the back of his truck. And man, they fucked everywhere! Then, you were born. Christine Hargensen, whose daddy-o's rich and whose momma is a slutty bitch, with floppy titties that every man sucked on."  
  
"They did NOT!"  
  
"Oh, I'm sure they did. Shall I name a few? Let's see, Tommy, Billy, Chuckie, Angelo, Tony, Sheldon...shall I go on?"  
  
"I'll destroy you, you obscene little fucker!" said Chris, her face red with anger and embarrassment.  
  
"Go right ahead, Chris," said Becky. "I'd like to see you try."  
  
Chris raised her fist to hit Becky, but she stopped. She didn't want to start any trouble because she knew she already was in enough trouble. Thankfully, her father never knew what went on in school, but the school did.  
  
"I HATE you!" Chris screamed. "Shit eater!"  
  
"Good choice, Chris," said Becky. "And you know, if your Momma and Daddy hadn't been such bitches, we could've really shared something."  
  
Chris just walked away, fuming. Sue and the other girls looked shocked, speechless, unable to retort back. She was too good for them.  
  
"Jesus, she's horrible!" said Chris.  
  
"I know," said Sue. "But why? Being brought up religious and all. I just don't understand..."  
  
Soon, Becky could see blood running down a freckled thigh...but who's? Then a bony hand and a pair of eyes, looking confused. Then, the hand opened like a blossoming flower and a red liquid trickled down the crevices between the fingers. The pair of eyes became frightened and shocked...it was Carrie's hand and eyes; Becky was sure of it. A frightened, panicked whimper exited Carrie's mouth as she looked down to see where the blood was coming from.  
  
That's when Carrie ran out of the shower, naked, screaming insanely; the shower was left running. There was blood running down her leg and in her hand.  
  
"Help me!" she screamed. "Becky! Help me!"  
  
"What's wrong, Car?" she asked, seeing her naked sister; her face white as chalk and her eyes filled with terror.  
  
"Help me, Becky! I'm bleeding!" She grabbed Becky's sweater, leaving a bloody handprint.  
  
"Here, have a tampon, Carrie," taunted Chris, dangling a tampon in Carrie's face, and then threw it at her, hitting her in the chest and a red flower blossomed on the absorbent cotton.  
  
"Shut up, Chris!" Becky said. "It's OK, calm down, Car..."  
  
"Carrie's got her period!" Chris cut in, laughing.  
  
The girls burst into peals of insane laughter; Carrie was screaming insanely, eyes and mouth wide open, screaming.  
  
"Shut up!" Becky said, but the noise drowned her. "Stop it!"  
  
"Help me! Help me!" Carrie screamed; her high pitched screams echoed throughout the locker room, equivalent to a frightened child in the dark. She looked at the blood again in terror.  
  
Soon, the girls took out tampons and sanitary napkins from their purses, even some from the broken dispenser, which Sue pulled the front off, and they pelted it at her like peanuts, chanting, insanely laughing:  
  
"Plug it up, plug it up, plug it up..."  
  
Carrie was in the corner of the shower, cowering with fear, naked, covered with tampons and napkins, next underwear and dirty socks. There was a sea of tampons and napkins at her feet and a tampon stuck in the middle of her pubic hair, making Becky sick to her stomach.  
  
Anger boiled inside Becky's little thin body for this was beyond all the sick acts the student body had done on her sister...it was the last straw that broke the camel's back, the one that crossed the line...she had promised for long years to never let the push out again.  
  
(just once won't hurt anyone...just a tiny bit)  
  
Her teeth and fists clenched; her fingernails dug into the palms of her hands, which began to sweat profusely. Her blood was hot and blood pressure shot from 180/90 to 190/100; her heart was hammering in her brain and the sweat dripped from her forehead. Her temperature 103 degrees. The heat in the locker room began to intensify; some of the lockers trembled and the chants seemed to have faded into silence.  
  
(you like the smell of burnt toast, chris? don't you just love the smell of that charred black burnt toast? no! you seem more like a bacon eater. like burnt charred bacon? delicious, isn't it? well, you know burnt bacon smells like? Flesh...sweet, burnt, charred flesh...)  
  
The room was 110 degrees...the sweat soaked her entire body, the water dripping from the showers boiled, her hair flew again from below her and her eyeballs burned as they strained, her brain ready to explode. Yet, nobody seemed to notice the room was getting hotter by the second.  
  
(push, becky, push...burn, chris, burn)  
  
She looked at Chris's shoes.  
  
(I'll burn those fuckin shoes right off your pretty silky feet, chris)  
  
Then, there was a panicked scream, coming from Chris. Her shoes were on fire!  
  
"FIRE!" she screamed. "HELP ME! I'M ON FIRE!"  
  
The girls stopped what they were doing and screamed at the yellow orange flames that licked her shoes.  
  
(burn them all, becky, they all deserve to burn)  
  
Soon, the tampons and sanitary napkins that they were holding burst into flames. The girls screamed at the yellow orange flames, stomping them out; the smoke was a soft grey as they stomped them out and there was a horrible smell of cloth, cardboard and plastic burning. They waved at the flames, but they only spread quicker. Some stomped out the flames.  
  
"Put me out!" Chris screamed. The flames spread onto her jeans and Chris screamed louder as the flames spread, the heat burning her.  
  
That was when the door pumped open with a flat and hurried bang and Miss Collins, burst in to see what was all the screaming and noise was about. She saw that Chris's shoes were on fire.  
  
"Don't move, just stop..." she said. "The flames will only spread."  
  
"Put me out!" Chris screamed, panickly. "Put me OUT!!"  
  
"Calm down, Chris."  
  
Miss Collins dragged Chris into the showers, turned the water on, and put the flames out. Chris was crying hysterically.  
  
(shit! I shouldn't have let it out again!)  
  
"How did this happen?" she asked.  
  
"I don't know," sobbed Chris. "I was just standing there...then, all of a sudden, I just caught fire...I don't know how..."  
  
"Come on, Chris," said Miss Collins. "You weren't smoking in here, were you? You know that smoking is not allowed in school."  
  
"I wasn't! I don't know how it happened!"  
  
"Yea. Plus, the sanitary napkins and tampons too, Miss Collins," said Sue. "They caught on fire too."  
  
"Miss Collins," said Becky, pushing her way through the crowd. "They were smoking...I saw them. And they were teasing of Carrie!"  
  
"Lying tattletale shit!" hissed Chris, hitting Becky on the back of the head.  
  
"Go fuck your Daddy, dirty pussy cunt!" Becky hissed through her teeth.  
  
Chris prepared to charge at Becky; she wished she had set Chris's hair or her body on fire instead of her shoes...maybe even her pretty face.  
  
"Why you little bitch..." Chris hissed.  
  
"All right, Chris. Let it go. Don't start anything," said Miss Collins. To Becky, "And Rebecca White! And I'm surprised at you. A nice girl yourself using dirty language. We do not use that kind of language. Do you understand, young lady?"  
  
"Sorry, Miss Collins."  
  
Miss Collins ran to Carrie, Becky behind her; Carrie was sitting on the floor, naked, screaming in a panic.  
  
"Carrie, Carrie!" said Miss Collins. "Calm down and clean yourself up."  
  
Carrie shrieked insanely, clutching Miss Collins and her sister. She left another bloody handprint on Becky's white sweater and one on Miss Collins's white shorts. She slapped her hard across the face, causing Becky to jump. She wanted to let the push out again, but thinking it over, she would've slapped Carrie too if she was going this insane.  
  
"Calm down, Carrie and get up and clean yourself up...damn it! Will you do it yourself! You act as if you've never had your period before."  
  
Carrie shook her head violently, screamed, and pushed Miss Collins away.  
  
Suddenly, the light bulb in the showers exploded; shards of glass flew everywhere. Sue looked at the light bulb and the other girls gasped, then giggled at frightened Carrie. Carrie buried her frightened face in Miss Collins' blue cotton breasts of her sweater and sobbed.  
  
"Go on!" said Miss Collins, sternly at the other girls. "Get out of here! Go on! Shoo!"  
  
The girls dispersed out of the locker room, some dressed, some still in their underwear, and some wrapped in towels.  
  
"It's OK, Carrie," said Becky.  
  
She knelt down beside her sister, who clutched her sweater tightly.  
  
"Carrie?" said Miss Collins. "Carrie, is this your first period? I'm sorry, I didn't know." Her voice sounded sad and worried. "Now, see? Everyone's gone, see? Now, come on, don't you know?"  
  
Carrie only stared stupidly, her eyes were wet blue forget-me-nots and her body trembled in terror.  
  
Becky could see that the blood had grown darker and it was smeared and splattered on Carrie's thighs like she had walked through a river of blood.  
  
"My stomach..." Carrie groaned, burying her face into her sister's blue cotton sweater. "It hurts..."  
  
"It'll pass," said Becky, stroking her wet hair. It was sleek beneath her pale fingertips. For she remembered her first at the age of thirteen: the cramps, the blood...the works. Carrie clutched to her sister, sobbing miserably and her body trembling; her wet body soaked Becky's sweater.  
  
"You have to stop the flow of blood...you..." Miss Collins said.  
  
"Please, ma'am," said Becky quietly. "Let me. You know, sister to sister."  
  
Miss Collins nodded. "All right, Beck. Go ahead."  
  
To Carrie, she said, "Watch. You do this..."  
  
~  
  
Miss Collins tried to explain twice the meaning of menstruation, but she only covered her ears.  
  
"Miss Collins," Becky said. "Please let me try. It's a sisterly thing."  
  
"But, it's no use," said Miss Collins. "She refuses to cooperate."  
  
"Please..." Becky's black eyes shined as if though she were a prisoner pleading for mercy.  
  
"Very well." Miss Collins turned to leave the room.  
  
The room was quiet and Carrie knelt next to her sister, clutching her sweater, trembling and crying.  
  
"All right, Car," she said, sighing. "See, we're all alone. So, can I tell you?"  
  
Carrie nodded her head.  
  
Then, she began: "Menstruation is when the uterine wall sheds..."  
  
"Ohuh?" said Carrie, interrupted, confused.  
  
Becky sighed and said, "OK! But you have to swear to me that you will never tell Momma about this book I have 'cause if she found out, I'll be locked in the closet for eternity."  
  
Carrie nodded her head.  
  
Becky opened her knapsack and pulled out a black book that had on the front: HUMAN ANATOMY. She watched as she flipped through the pages and saw a woman's naked body...oh! What a sin it was! Carrie blushed hard.  
  
"OK," said Becky, flipping towards a page with the words: FEMALE REPRODUCTIVE SYSTEM and saw a sinful photo of a woman's reproductive system.  
  
"This is the uterus," she said, pointing to a drawing what looked like an upside-down pear. "It's a hollow organ where the baby grows. It's also a really strong muscle so it can push the baby out."  
  
"What are those?" she asked, pointing to two almond shapes.  
  
"They're ovaries," said Becky. "That's where the eggs grow and one way a baby is made."  
  
"And these?" She pointed to a set of tubes.  
  
"Fallopian tubes. That's how the eggs come out. This is how menstruation begins: an egg in the ovaries is formed. While the egg is being formed, the uterine wall thickens, preparing it for fertilization. Once the egg is ready, it bursts out of the ovary and goes down the Fallopian tube." She traced her finger showing the path of the egg. "It takes about a few days or a week 'till it reaches the uterus and if the egg is unfertilized, ta- da, your period. The uterine wall sheds, which is how we see it as blood. This lasts about four or five days."  
  
"How does it come out?"  
  
"It flows out of this little thing here," said Becky, pointing to a skinny looking canal, "called the vagina."  
  
"If the egg is fertilized, then what?"  
  
"If the egg is fertilized, it implants itself to the uterine wall and grows there for about nine months and ta-da, there you are, a whole human baby. Then, after nine months, your Momma births you. You're shoved from her uterus and out her vagina and into the world...and ta-da, you are born."  
  
"How does the egg get fertilized?"  
  
"Now, that part is where it gets really dirty."  
  
"Tell me!"  
  
"OK...but swear you'll never tell Momma I said this."  
  
She leaned over towards Carrie and whispered all the dirty sinful details that her sister had an incredible knowledge about. She grimaced and blushed at the dirty parts.  
  
"So, that's what the Sin of Intercourse is?"  
  
"It's called 'sexual intercourse', Carrie, not the Sin of Intercourse. And it's not a sin if you're married, Car. If you commit fornication, then it's a sin. There's a big difference."  
  
"Fornication?"  
  
"It's when a man fucks you when you're not married. When that happens, you're called a slut or a whore, in other words, a prostitute. But, if a man fucks you when you're married, you're called a wife."  
  
"Prostitute?"  
  
"It's a woman who fucks men for money. But don't ever do it! That's an easy way you get 'phylis."  
  
"'Phylis?"  
  
"Syphilis, Carrie. It's a sexually transmitted disease and if you don't treat it, you can fuck up your body. Some people even go mad. That's why the psych is filled with mad patients. Get it Carrie?"  
  
Carrie nodded. "I think so. Thanks, Becky."  
  
"Anytime. But if I catch you fucking anyone, I'll kick your ass. Got it?"  
  
Carrie nodded. "I won't, I won't." 


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter IV  
  
From The Shadow and Flame Exploded (p. 12)  
  
Becky and Carrie sat in the office together. Becky held Carrie's hand; it was sweaty and trembling. Becky stroked her hand with her own gently whispering, "It's all right. Calm down, Car." She held her close to her small bosom and kissed the corner of her temple, stroking her hair with one hand.  
  
"You let the push out, didn't?" Carrie whispered. "You set Chris on fire, didn't you?"  
  
"I couldn't help it..." Becky said, near tears. "I tried...I would never mean to hurt anyone..."  
  
"I know, Beck...I know you wouldn't."  
  
Becky could hear Mr. Morton, the principal say to Miss Collins:  
  
"Isn't she a little old...?"  
  
"To have her period?"  
  
"What I don't understand is how a girl through three years of high school could be unaware to the fact of menstruation."  
  
"But I wonder why her mother never told her about it?"  
  
"There's nothing wrong with beliefs."  
  
"You see, Morty, the fact is, I know how they felt. I mean it was just her period for God's sake."  
  
"What about her sister? Surely, she's had it before."  
  
"She did at thirteen. Pretty young and savvy about it as well. Knows everything about all dirty things in general."  
  
"What kind of dirty things in general?"  
  
"She keeps a human anatomy book in her backpack and she knows the works of dirty words, slang, and all that. I'm amazed at her, being raised by a religious mother. It doesn't make sense how a religiously raised girl would know all these dirty facts."  
  
"I'll send them home," He pressed on a button to the intercom and said, "Miss Finch, send Cassie and Betty Wright into the office,"  
  
"It's Carrie and Becky White," said Miss Collins.  
  
The girls walked into the office; Becky held her trembling hand.  
  
"Come in, Cassie and Betty."  
  
"Carrie and Becky," corrected Miss Collins.  
  
"We're so sorry, Cassie," said Mr. Morton. "Miss Finch, please get me dismissal slips for Cassie and Betty."  
  
She saw her sister staring at the ashtray on Mr. Morton's desk. She saw that it trembled a bit and a low buzz sound following.  
  
"It's Carrie," she said, quietly.  
  
Do you want to go to the infirmary? Lie down a while?"  
  
Carrie shook her head. The ashtray shook again.  
  
"Do you need a ride home? Could call you a taxi."  
  
Carrie shook her head slowly.  
  
"I'm sure they can walk," said Miss Collins. "It would do them good." To Carrie, she said, "And Carrie, you're dismissed from gym for a week, Carrie. You just go to study hall, OK?"  
  
Carrie nodded.  
  
"You take care of your sister, OK, Becky," she said to Becky.  
  
"I will, ma'am," said Becky, quietly, still watching the ashtray tremble, which increased.  
  
"We're all sorry that this incident, Cassie," said Mr. Morton.  
  
"It's CARRIE!" screamed Carrie suddenly. Soon, Mr. Morton's ashtray flew in the air...the ashtray smashed, cigarettes and ashes scattered on the brown tile floor, causing Miss Collins to jump out of her seat. She knelt down to pick up the broken pieces.  
  
Carrie grabbed her sister's hand and ran out the door.  
  
Graffiti was scratched on a desk in Chamberlain Junior High School:  
  
Roses are red, violets are blue, sugar is sweet, but Carrie and Becky White eat shit  
  
Below it, it said:  
  
Roses are red, violets are blue, your Momma's a whore and so are you!  
  
Becky walked her sister home down Ewen Avenue and crossed Carlin Street at the stoplight at the corner. She clutched onto Becky's hand tightly; she could feel her shaking violently. As the girls walked up the street, Becky could hear Carrie's voice speaking in her head:  
  
[They all hate and they never stop! They never get tired of it!]  
  
Becky looked at her sister.  
  
"What?" she asked.  
  
"Nothing..." said Becky.  
  
Soon, Carrie's voice came back to her head:  
  
[Imagine Chris Hargensen all bloody and screaming for mercy with rats crawling all over her face. Good! That would be good! Crush her head in with a boulder. Crush all their heads in. And Becky would burn her pretty silken skin charred black...Good! Good!]  
  
Carrie and Becky had tried to fit in. They defied Momma in every way they could by trying to erase that red plague circle that had been drawn around them that dominated the environment on Carlin Street and had walked up to Barker Street Grammar School with Bibles under their arms. But, they still could remember that day, the stares, and the sudden silence when the both of them got down on their knees before lunch in the school cafeteria—the laughter had begun on that day and echoed through the years. They never got down on their knees again in public.  
  
At Christian Youth Camp, they tried to fit in...nothing seemed to work. All those torturous weeks of let's short sheet Carrie and Becky's beds and hide their underpants somewhere and put snakes in their shoes and duck Carrie again and again. Them slow pokes on bike trips, smelling sweaty and not able to catch up and catching poison ivy from urinating in the bushes (hey scratch-asses, your asses itch?).  
  
Becky remembered the she had let the push out for the first time at Christian Youth Camp after ten years of swearing she wouldn't. Momma forbade Carrie and Becky to swim because she said it was a darkly sin committed by the Antichrists. Yet they did swim and they laughed while ducking Carrie again and again.  
  
And Becky watched them duck her sister and laugh while she struggled... she tried very hard not to let the push out. She concentrated hard and began to push; it felt like pushing a large boulder after ten years of hibernation. Next, the lake began to bubble and then it was boiling hot. Everyone in that lake was scalded to death...only Carrie was spared. The camp nurse couldn't explain how the kids ended up with such horrible second-degree burns just from swimming in the lake. Becky remembered seeing how their skins was nearly destroyed from the boiling incident, how horrible their moans and groans of pain they were in...how she regretted it!  
  
They also had tried to participate in camp activities, yet more practical jokes on ol' prayin' Carrie and Becky. When they crossed the line, Becky pushed back like when she pushed and ignited Freddy Jones' pants, giving him first-degree burns for putting shit in Carrie's bed. And another time she let it out and set Jeannie McGee's hair on fire after finding out that she had found a love letter written by Carrie to Bobby Flash and she had copied it and passed it around.  
  
But after letting the push out, the aftermath was terrible: after, she would seek a solitary place and cry, knowing that her talent was uncontrollable and dangerous. People got hurt because of her stupid push! Maybe if they didn't tease Carrie, her push wouldn't come out...  
  
Both were sent home a week early on the bus. Momma picked the girls up from the station, Carrie and Becky, both red eyed and weeping. Momma told the girls that they should treasure the memory of scourging and that the only hope of salvation was inside the red circle. "For strait is the gate," said Momma grimly in the taxi and at home, she sent the girls to the closet for six hours.  
  
At school, they had tried to fit in. Nothing worked. First it was the peanut butter in Carrie's hair when she fell asleep then gum in Becky's hair (the deed done by Billy Preston, which Becky had scratched his eyes out), the outstretched legs to trip them, pinches, books knocked off the desk, Carrie missing the ball in gym class, Becky falling on her face at the dance in her sophomore year and losing a tooth, them running into the volley ball net; Becky wearing stockings with runs in them and Carrie with sweat stains under the arms of her blouses; even the time Chris calling her from the Beehive Restaurant, asking if pig shit was spelled C-A-R-R-I-E.  
  
"Hey, Chris, you stupid, smelly pussy," said Becky on the telephone. "Smell that smoke? Your skirt's on fire."  
  
And Becky, hearing those lovely screams as she burned, laughed.  
  
"Next time, look before you sit your ass on a burning stove, hot ass!"  
  
Momma had, of course, forbid the girls to shower with other girls, saying that God made Adam and Eve ashamed to be naked; Carrie had hidden her shower things in her school locker and showered anyway. Becky was completely deaf to Momma...she refused to let Momma and her angry God dominate her. She believed in the Marxist saying: "Religion is the opium of society."  
  
"Car, you know what I'm going to do?" said Becky suddenly, interrupting their remembrance of those years of being mocked. "I'm gonna get my ears pierced and my wrists tattooed!"  
  
"No!" screeched Carrie. "Momma will get angry!"  
  
"Aw, fuck what that ol' prayin' fuckin' cunt says!"  
  
[how dare she say such things about our mother!] Carrie hit Becky's face, gently but sternly.  
  
"Don't say that about our mother!" she said, sternly.  
  
Becky cupped her hand on her face. "You're right...I'm sorry."  
  
"Beck, don't do it! Momma will beat you."  
  
"I don't care what Momma does to me, Car."  
  
Carrie didn't say anything because she knew her sister was too stubborn to bend to her pleas.  
  
Tommy Erbter, age five, was biking up the other side of the street. He was small, intense looking boy on a twenty-inch Schwinn with bright training wheels. He saw Carrie and Becky, brightened, stuck his tongue out.  
  
"Creepy Carrie! Scary Becky! You're both creepy and scary!" He laughed as he peddled away from them.  
  
(you like fire, kid? like playing with fire? pretty when small but deadly...push, becky, push...)  
  
She heard Carrie's voice in her head:  
  
[fall off that bike kid push you off that bike and split your rotten head open]  
  
Soon, the tires smoked a soft grey smoke...and the bike wobbled and suddenly fell over. Tommy screamed and the bike fell on top of him. He looked scared when he saw that the tires were smoking a soft grey smoke.  
  
"You like fire, kid?" asked Becky, her eyes glittering nastily.  
  
Tommy shook his head hard; there were tears in his frightened eyes.  
  
"Well, lemme tell you something, you stupid shit. Never play with fire 'cause you never know when it'll light and burn your fuckin ass off, you rotten little fucker."  
  
Becky saw Tommy's frightened face stare at her black glittering eyes; she saw he had turned pale and a dark spot between his legs on his pants and smelt urine...Tommy had wet his pants. She smiled, glad that she scared him.  
  
"Diamond, opal, jade, I smell Tommy's lemonade..." she sang softly in a haunting tune. Tommy trembled in terror when he heard that haunting tune.  
  
They left Tommy, lying there nursing his hurt knee and still frightened of scary Becky, Carrie looked at her sister.  
  
"Did you see the stupid shit's face?" Becky laughed.  
  
"You're crazy," Carrie laughed.  
  
"Did you push him over?" Becky said quietly.  
  
"Did you set his tires on fire?"  
  
Becky and Carrie smiled.  
  
Becky did get her ears pierced and her wrists tattooed. On her wrists were tattooed: CARRIE and BECKY, one on the right and one on the left. She moved her hair in front of her face, hiding her earrings.  
  
Once she got home, she walked up the stairs, towards her room. But stopped when she saw door opened a crack and peeked in and saw her sister, staring in the mirror, in her underwear and bra. She could see her sister's pimply back and felt a surge of sympathy for Becky hardly had any pimples.  
  
She watched as Carrie slipped off her heavy cotton bra and let it fall. Her breasts were milky white, upright, and smooth. The nipples were light coffee color. She ran her hands over them and a little shiver went through her.  
  
[Evil, bad, evil...this is bad; this is evil...]  
  
She ran her hands over her breasts again and tweaked one of her nipples. Becky could hear her voice, saying:  
  
[I wanna tear these off! I wanna rip it off, crush it, kill it. Only Momma is good. Momma battled the Black Man and drove him out and vanquished him. She tore off her dirty pillows and is pure.]  
  
She watched as she stared at her face and touched it.  
  
[I hate my face, my stupid dull bovine face with pimples and vapid, glassy eyes. I wish I looked like Becky...she's prettier than me!]  
  
Suddenly, Becky could've sworn she saw something happen to the mirror. The glass wobbled inward and out. Then, it did it again. Soon, the reflection split by a jagged, silvery crack. The mirror shattered and pieces of glass splashed at her feet. Becky jumped; causing the floorboard near their door creaked loudly. Carrie turned around and saw her sister, standing in the door. She covered her breasts with her shirt.  
  
"Sorry!" Becky said, blushing. "I didn't mean to..."  
  
"Don't be sorry," she said.  
  
Becky sat on Carrie's bed and she buried her face into her small bosom; Becky could feel the tears soak through her heavy cotton blouse and her body tremble.  
  
"Oh, Beck! I was so scared!" she sobbed.  
  
"I know," she said softly.  
  
"But, I'm glad you told me...what..." she wrinkled her face in disgust.  
  
"What a period is?"  
  
"Yes. Thank you."  
  
"That's what I'm here for, Car. If you want to know anything, just ask me."  
  
From Oglivie's Dictionary of Psychic Phenomenon  
  
Telekinesis is the ability to move or cause changes in objects by force of the mind  
  
Telepathy is communication between minds by some means other than the normal sensory channels; a common symptom of telepathy is hearing voices  
  
Clairvoyance is the ability to be aware of objects, people, and events without use of the five senses  
  
But one question remained: how was it that Becky could start fires? How did these fires start when she was angry or scared?  
  
Pyrokinesis is the ability to ignite or cause to ignite fires by the force of the mind 


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter V  
  
From The Shadow Exploded (p. 20)  
  
Becky stared out the window; she could hear Momma talking to Mrs. Snell, just a few blocks down the street.  
  
"Oh, hello, Mrs. White," said Mrs. White.  
  
"Hello, Mrs. Snell," she said, smiling. "How's the doctor?"  
  
"Fine, thank you."  
  
"And your daughter?"  
  
"Sue's just fine. Won't you come in?"  
  
"Oh, how kind!" Mrs. White entered.  
  
"I believe Carrie is in some of Sue's classes."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Perhaps she'd like to come over and visit sometime."  
  
"I'm here on the Lord's Work, spreading the Gospel through the Salvation of Blood of Jesus," she said.  
  
"Yes, of course," said Mrs. Snell, her voice trying to be positive as if though resisting concern.  
  
"Wait! I think this would interest you and the doctor. 'The Teenagers Path of the Cross Through the Salvation of Jesus.'" She handed Mrs. Snell a book.  
  
She looked at the book and her face fell with disgust. "Oh, I don't Sue would be too interested," she said.  
  
"Children are wandering through the wilderness of sin these days," she said.  
  
"My Sue is a good girl," her voice was now bothered.  
  
"These are godless times, Mrs. Snell," said Momma.  
  
"I'll drink to that," said Mrs. Snell, smiling. She suddenly stopped, realizing what she had said.  
  
(shut up, momma! dark times are what you're living in! you live in the fuckin' dark ages...just shut up! you are an embarrassment to the human race...just shut the fuck up!)  
  
Phone rang. Mrs. Snell answered it and Momma looking for a verse in the Bible.  
  
"I'm sorry, Betty. I'll have to call you back. Margaret White is here. Yes...I know. I'll get rid of her. Bye."  
  
"I think you'd like to hear this..." Momma said, then opened her mouth to say her verse from the Bible.  
  
"Mrs. White," Mrs. Snell, interrupted, desperate to get rid of the crazy woman. "I'd like to contribute five...ten dollars."  
  
"I see," said Mrs. White, disappointed she didn't get to read her verse. She opened her poor box and Mrs. Snell put ten dollars in. Mrs. Snell showed her to the door. "I pray you find Jesus," said Momma.  
  
She walked out the door.  
  
~  
  
Momma was coming home. Carrie watched as Momma came up the walk, and her belly trembled and Becky sat on her bed, staring at the wall blankly.  
The White bungalow was a simple house, painted white, but it was more of a faded grey because it showed signs that it hadn't been washed in years with two floors: the first floor and the attic where Carrie and Becky slept and the bathroom. The curtains were always drawn, refusing light into the house, making the house dark.  
Let's go inside the White house, shall we? The kitchen was small with a single table with a sink, a cutting board and sets of green cabinets with a single light hanging from the ceiling that could be flicked on with a switch near the entrance. The floor was white and tiled. Just a few inches near the refrigerator was a little broom closet.  
  
The dining room, next door to the kitchen, had three straight-backed chairs: Momma sat at the head of the table, closest to the living room and Carrie sat on the other end of the table with Becky on her left. Hanging on the wall was a magnificent tapestry of DaVinci's panting of The Last Supper with candles that would be lit, making it seem like you were actually there at the Last Supper with Jesus in the middle and the Twelve Apostles surrounding him, questioning about what he said. The telephone was just  
  
As for the living room, there was just two straight-backed chairs, one was a near a sewing machine with a light where sometimes Carrie or Momma made dresses and the other was a rocking chair where Momma often sat and crocheted doilies while she listened to the radio while the girls sat on the floor on the faded, threadbare rug. There was no television; Momma believed that television was a sin.  
  
The girls' room was just up a flight of narrow, twisted stairs that was in an attic. There were mannequins, some old materials, threads, books, and lots of other things in unopened boxes. The girls' room was tiny: Becky and Carrie's beds were tiny; Becky slept near the window while Carrie slept adjacent to Becky, near the wall. Their room was decorated with a drawing of Jesus wearing a crown of thorns above Carrie's bed and a porcelain statue of the Virgin Mary on the dresser that Becky had decorated with candles and roses around. She wore a veil over her head and a handkerchief, which served as a robe over her shoulders. Becky loved Mary and always wanted her as a mother; she was the only person she prayed to.  
  
"If Momma can't love me like a real mother," Becky once said to Carrie. "Mary will be my mother. She loves me even if I'm a sickly, ugly girl with black eyes."  
  
The bathroom was just near the stairs, opposite from the girls' room. The floor was tile white with a white rug near the white porcelain bathtub that had clawed feet and an old-fashioned faucet and plug. There was no shower; Momma said showers were sinful.  
  
As for the rest of the house, it was decorated with nothing but religious pictures: ones with the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Virgin Mary, and a few saints. Carrie's favorite was the one in the living room where Jesus leading lambs on a smooth, green hill, making it seem so peaceful. Becky's favorite was the one of Saint Anne, the mother of the Virgin Mary with the little embryo of Mary inside her, both of them praying. The others were frightening: one where Jesus driving the moneychangers out of the temple, Moses casting down the Ten Commandments at the worshippers of the golden calf, and doubting Thomas, thrusting his fingers inside the side wound of Jesus (that one frightened the girls, giving them chilling sensations of pain and horror), Noah's ark floating above while the sinners drowned outside, and the murder of the baby boys of Egypt's slaves while baby Moses escapes down the Nile and of the baby boys in Jerusalem while Mary, Joseph and the Infant Jesus flee to Egypt.  
  
Momma was a very big woman, her legs had begun to swell and her feet seemed on the point of overflowing her shoes. Her eyes were sky blue and her blonde hair hung loose. She always carried a black satchel purse and in it was her change purse and a large King James Bible (also black) with her name stamped on the front in gold. The hands were unpolished with a gold wedding band on her left ring finger and the breasts were large, yet covered. She wore a black cloth cloak with a matching dress, coming to the calves with a little Sacred Heart of Jesus sewn on the breast pocket and little droplets of blood leaking (Becky remembered tracing that little heart with a finger while sitting on Momma's lap as she read a verse from the Bible).  
  
"Momma, what's that?" five-year-old Becky asked, tracing that little heart.  
  
"It's the Sacred Heart of Jesus, Rebecca," said Momma softly.  
  
"Why is it bleeding Momma?"  
  
"Because, Rebecca, our Lord was pierced with a spear when he died on the cross."  
  
"But why is it on fire?"  
  
"Because our Lord has eternal love for all of us, Rebecca."  
  
"Does Jesus love me, Momma?"  
  
"If you pray to Him, He'll love you even more."  
  
Momma opened the door and walked stolidly in. Soon the telephone rang.  
  
"Yes?" she answered. "Yes?" Soon, she was silent.  
  
Becky and Carrie came down the stairs; Becky could hear Miss Collins' voice on the other line:  
  
"Carrie had her first period. We sent her home early today. Becky explained to her what menstruation was."  
  
Becky could see her eyes turn round with shock.  
  
[Wicked, poisonous girl!] Momma thought.  
  
"Thank you," she said quietly. She soon hung up the phone and turned towards the door where Becky and Carrie were listening.  
  
"I know you're listening, girls," she said softly up the stairs. "Come on down."  
  
She turned towards the table and took out one of her books from her satchel on the table.  
  
"Momma, who was that?" said Carrie. "Who called?"  
  
"You're a woman, now," she said softly to Carrie. Then, to Becky, "And you are a poisonous flower."  
  
But why did Momma call her a 'poisonous flower'? What did she ever do? She knew Momma never favored her, but she always was the scapegoat of the White family, blamed for every little sin that she probably never even done.  
  
Becky saw her sister's face twist and crumpling, trying to resist crying.  
  
"Why didn't you tell me, Momma?" she sobbed.  
  
Momma walked towards Carrie first, and now her hand flashed with sudden speed. It was hard, laundry-calloused and muscled. It struck Carrie backhand across the jaw. Then, she slapped Becky, only harder. Both fell at her feet.  
  
"Jesus Christ, Momma, what the hell did I do?" Becky sobbed; her voice was high like a frightened child alone in the dark.  
  
Momma opened a book, titled 'THE BOOK OF SINS', turning it to the chapter, titled: 'SINS OF WOMAN'.  
  
"And God made Eve from the rib of Adam," Momma said, reading from the book. "And Eve was weak and loose the raven on the world. And the raven was called Sin. Say it, woman."  
  
"No, Momma..." said Carrie.  
  
"Momma, what did I do? I didn't do anything!" Becky sobbed.  
  
"You poisoned your sister. You've taught her filth!" She hit Becky in the face with the book. To Carrie she said, "And the raven was called Sin...say it, woman?"  
  
"No, Momma..."  
  
Hit with the book again.  
  
"And the raven was called Sin."  
  
"And-and the raven was called Sin," the girls repeated.  
  
"And the first sin was Intercourse...say it."  
  
"I didn't sin, Momma."  
  
"First sin was Intercourse, first sin was Intercourse...say it!" She hit Carrie with the book.  
  
"Momma, God wanted us to have sex so we could..." Becky began.  
  
"Silence, you wicked child!" The spine of the book thumped Becky's skull and she screamed in pain. "And the first sin was Intercourse...say it, girls!"  
  
"And the first sin was Intercourse," Carrie and Becky sobbed.  
  
"Oh, Momma... I was so scared!" Carrie sobbed. "I thought I was dying! And all the girls laughed at me and threw things at me. But, Becky saved me, she..."  
  
"And Eve was weak. Say it, woman."  
  
"No, Momma...please help me!" Hit again with the book.  
  
"Eve was weak, Eve was weak, Eve was weak...Say it, woman!" her hand shook the book after every syllable.  
  
"No, Momma!"  
  
"Eve was weak! Say it!"  
  
Carrie sobbed. "Eve was weak. Eve was weak."  
  
"And the Lord visited Eve with a Curse, the Curse of Blood..." Her eyes glanced up at the heavens in a zealous manner.  
  
"Momma," Becky began, "it's not a curse. It's a normal bodily function... " She was slapped again, but she ignored it and kept talking. "Momma, you are just misunderstood," Becky began to explain. "You're just messing the whole..."  
  
She got kicked hard in the thigh; the heat jumped about five degrees from normal. "Do not speak, spawn of Satan!" said Momma. "You are the fruit of all evil, a child of corruption, the princess of poison and darkness, Jezebel, Herodias, Salome, Satan's own daughter..."  
  
The temperature began to rise to 100 degrees as it read on the kitchen thermometer.  
  
"Momma, stop calling me that!" Becky said.  
  
"Bow your heads!" said Momma. "Let us pray."  
  
"You should've told me!" Carrie cried.  
  
Momma fell to her knees, grabbing both Carrie and Becky's wrists.  
  
"O Lord," Momma exclaimed loudly, her head thrown back, looking at the ceiling, full of zeal, "help these sinning women beside me see their sins of their days and ways. Show them that if they remained sinless, the Curse of Blood would have never come on them. They may have had committed the Sin of Lustful Thoughts and tempted by the Antichrist. Show them your kind, vengeful hand at work..."  
  
"No!" the girls screeched simultaneously. "No, Momma!"  
  
"...And your Sign that they must walk the straight path from here on out if they are to avoid the agonies of the Eternal Pit. Am..."  
  
"Oh, Lord," said Becky, interrupting loudly, "make this fuckin' cunt shut the fuck up and push her into Satan's black door into his world of madness."  
  
Becky got slapped again. "SIN!" she screeched.  
  
"Momma, we didn't do anything," Carrie said.  
  
"Don't lie to me, Carrietta. I can see inside you two. I can see the sin in you and your sister's eyes. We'll pray."  
  
She grabbed her daughters by the wrists, dragged them across the kitchen floor, towards the closet.  
  
"No!" the girls screamed as they were being dragged. The thermometer read 105 degrees, the water in the sink boiled, and sweat began to trickle from their temples.  
  
"Pray, women, for forgiveness for your sins to Jesus!"  
  
"No! Momma!" screamed the girls, kicking madly and writhing their bodies like fish. "Momma! NO! NO!"  
  
She dragged her daughters into the closet. The door slammed and the dead bolt locked in place.  
  
"And the Lord visited Eve with a second Curse, the Curse of Childbearing, and Eve brought forth Cain in sweat and blood," said Momma over their screaming. "Genesis 3,16."  
  
"Momma! Let me out!" Carrie and Becky screamed in unison, pounding. Becky's screams the loudest; hers was equivalent to a child screaming in the dark, and her pounding was harder. The temperature rose even more...now it was 109.  
  
They were alone with Momma's angry God.  
The closet was more suited for a broom closet; it was small and a bit narrow. There was a small alter with a candle on the left side of the corpus of Jesus nailed to the wall, pierced with arrows, in a grotesque, muscle-straining agony of pain with a mouth in a wide open groaning, the eyes staring in slanted agony at the girls. But the blood...oh the blood was drenched over, from Jesus' hands, feet and chest where the arrows pierced His Body. Becky hated that crucifix...it frightened her, especially at night. She had nightmares about Jesus, just staring at her with those eyes, sometimes even calling her in the darkness...  
  
(paranoia)  
  
Carrie lit the candle and got on her knees next to Becky. She heard her sister saying the Lord's Prayer, sniffling and trembling. Becky couldn't bear to look at that horrible crucifix: those eyes just staring at her, giving her a chilling sensation of paranoia creeping up her spine.  
  
(those eyes are staring at me, those horrible eyes staring...stop staring at me)  
  
Becky's face was bruised, sweaty, and bloody. Her hair was scattered all over, she could taste the combination of snot on her wet lips, and her eyes were red, glittering with tears with anger and hate, which was as intense as the heat that rose. Blood pulsed in her head hard and her nerves screamed angrily and loudly inside her head. She looked at Carrie; also very beat up, hair scattered, sweaty, and teary-eyed.  
  
(no! I won't do it again! I swore! I swore to carrie that I would never start another fire again! back off...back off...back off...)  
  
Slowly, the temperature dropped to normal.  
  
"I can't stand it anymore," Becky wept, wiping her bloody nose. "I will ask God to give me the courage to die."  
  
"Becky," said Carrie, sniffling. "Stop talking nonsense."  
  
"I'm not...I'm serious." Her voice did sound serious. She knelt down and said, "Lord, give me the strength and courage to die. Take me away from this Hell I'm living...take me away! Just take me away!" She reached to skirt pocket and pulled out a razor blade from the razor.  
  
"NO!" said Carrie. "Don't, Beck!"  
  
"Goodbye, Carrie," said Becky, sobbing. "It's been wonderful having a sister like you. I will see you in the end."  
  
Slowly, she flexed her pale hand, making a slow hesitant slice, just above her tattoo; first there was a stinging pain and then the blood. It bled slowly from her vein from her tattooed wrist, bringing a chilling sensation up her spine as the red liquid seeped through the slice wounds. She was about to cut again, only a little more quicker, then Carrie slapped Becky hard across the face; the razor fell out of her hand and it was stained with scarlet blood. Becky cupped her bruised face; more tears fell from her melancholic ebony orbs.  
  
"Stop it, Beck!" screamed Carrie. "Stay with me! Pray with me!" She grabbed her sister's bleeding wrist; her hands could feel the hot blood flowing on her hands.  
  
"I'm sorry, Carrie!" sobbed Becky, miserably. "I'm so stupid! I'm glad you stopped me! I'm really glad you stopped me!"  
  
They hugged each other tightly, both crying. The blood from Becky's wrist smeared in Carrie's hair and soaked the back of her shirt. Carrie wrapped her bleeding sister's wrist tightly with her handkerchief to stop the bleeding; the scarlet blood seeped through the cotton.  
  
"I'll stay," sobbed Becky, miserably. "But why doesn't God hear me? He ignores me... He wants me to be miserable..."  
  
"Stop it, Beck! Just pray with me."  
  
"I can't...I just can't."  
  
"Just try, Beck. Please. Pray to Mary, she'll help you."  
  
"All right...I'll try."  
  
Six hours later, the girls came out of the closet. Momma was at her sewing machine, sewing yards of material.  
  
"Thank you, Momma," said Carrie, quietly.  
  
"You can go to bed now, girls," she said, not looking at them.  
  
Becky watched her sister lean over and kiss Momma on the cheek.  
  
(I'd like to burn that nice, smooth cheek of yours, momma. turn that pale creamy cheek of yours charred black...hear you scream when you're lit up...)  
  
Becky reluctantly she kissed her on the cheek; it was smooth and warm as she remembered.  
  
"Slut!" she hissed in her ear quietly.  
  
Momma looked at Becky with wide eyes, watching her youngest walk up the stairs following her sister. The two girls slipped into their nightgowns and crawled into bed. Carrie turned the light off.  
  
"Carrie?" said Becky's voice, trembling.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Let's be soul sisters."  
  
"What do soul sisters do?"  
  
"They stay together forever."  
  
"I'll stay with you."  
  
"Me too. Forever and ever."  
  
From The Flame Ignited (p. 16)  
  
Becky was lying in bed, but she couldn't sleep...she looked at the clock next to her bed. 10:20 it read. All she could think of was the push...the push that made heat and fire. She lay on her flat pillow, staring at the wall, hearing those voices: the laughter of students and Momma's angry, fanatical voice echoed. She turned over, seeing the glass of water on the table near her bed.  
  
She looked at a glass of water on the table, concentrating; the room got hotter and her temperature jumped to 103 degrees. Her eyes became tiny slits with black dots as she concentrated; the glass trembled...the water began to simmer, the glass fogged.  
  
(push... push... concentrate, beck, concentrate...make the water hot...)  
  
"He's got the power, washed in the blood of the Lamb..." Momma's voice sang, echoing in Becky's head...her brain ached with a headache.  
  
Now, steam came from the glass and it began to bubble slowly. Now, the bubbles increased, like a pot of boiling water and the fog and steam increased. The glass began to overflow with hot water and tremble as it boiled. Becky was sweaty, trembling, and hot inside. Her eyes burned, her blood scalding hot, her brain on fire, her heart racing, and her mouth tasted dry and cottony. Now she wanted the push to go away. How did she do it last time?  
  
(back off, back off, back off)  
  
The water began to slow down, yet the glass still trembled and the steam was still there. Soon, the glass burst into pieces...Carrie awoke with a start, hearing the glass shatter.  
  
(shit! too hot!)  
  
"Rebecca? Carrie?" Becky heard Momma say from downstairs. She heard her footsteps coming up the stairs. Becky could sense Momma grabbing the doorknob and pulling on it.  
  
"Carrie? Rebecca?" she said, rattling the door. "Open the door."  
  
"It's open, Momma," said Becky.  
  
(go to sleep, carrie...you never heard the noise.)  
  
Carrie rolled onto her side, pretending to sleep.  
  
Momma opened the door, her face looked suspicious at Becky.  
  
"What was that noise?" she asked.  
  
"What noise?" Becky said.  
  
"Go to sleep, Rebecca."  
  
"Yes ma'am," Becky said quietly.  
  
As Becky laid her head down, she found her pillow was soaking wet... 


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter VI  
  
From The Flame Ignited (p. 24)  
  
In English class, Becky sat just across from Carrie in the back. She listened as Mr. Fromm read Tommy Ross's poem; there were sounds of paper being thrown and the scratches of Carrie's pencil as she wrote down the poem. Mr. Fromm was a fat, old English teacher wearing a pair of glasses. Becky hated the bastard because he always made fun of her or Carrie. She didn't give a shit if he made fun of her, but it just crossed the line when he poked fun at Carrie.  
  
Becky felt tired from the push last night that the words Mr. Fromm read hummed in her ears like insects as he read a poem by Tommy Ross.  
  
"Well, Tommy," he said. "This is fairly an impressive poem." To the class, "Well, class, any criticism?"  
  
No one said a word.  
  
"Anyone?"  
  
"It's beautiful," Carrie said quietly.  
  
"Carrie White!" said Mr. Fromm. "Beautiful? Beautiful!" The voice was high and mocking. The students laughed. "'O beautiful, spacious skies with fields of amber waves of grain...'" he said mockingly. "Is that the beautiful you mean, Carrie?"  
  
Everyone laughed. Carrie said nothing.  
  
"Fuck you," Becky whispered quietly, through her teeth.  
  
"I'm sorry, Becky White," said Mr. Fromm, seeing Becky's lips move. "But did you say something?"  
  
"Did I?" Becky said, feigning innocence.  
  
"You did. What did you say?"  
  
"I said," Becky said; the hate and anger boiled inside, matching the room temperature. "Fuck you, you old fat cock-sucking queer!"  
  
Everyone gasped with shock. Mr. Fromm went white, then red.  
  
"Rebecca White!" he gasped. "You dare say such filthy obscenities to me!"  
  
Becky remained quiet, showing neither fear nor shame.  
  
(you deserved it, you fat fuck!)  
  
"Is there anything else you'd like to add, Becky?" he asked. "'Cause if you do, perhaps you'd like to tell Mr. Morton."  
  
Becky ignored him because she was looking at the coffee cup on Mr. Fromm's desk; she could taste the coffee, warm it was:  
  
(push, push...)  
  
"Well, if that is all, then I'm going to warn you if I hear such obscene things from you again, you can tell them to Mr. Morton," Mr. Fromm said.  
  
The coffee cup on Mr. Fromm's desk began to tremble and steamed quietly. Now, the cup began to boil and steam as if the cup were on a burner. Becky could taste the heat in the coffee; bubbles in her blood and steam on her forehead.  
  
(push, becky, push...burn that bastard's fuckin tongue off...)  
  
Soon as Mr. Fromm reached for his coffee cup to drink it, his eyes watered and popped out and turned red, sprayed hot coffee all over and his tongue lolled out, screaming in pain that one would only hear in the pit of a torture chamber in the Medieval times. Becky smiled, seeing that his tongue was a coral red and two times bigger than before.  
  
(good good good...)  
  
After class, Carrie and Becky walked towards their lockers. "Carrie," said Becky. "Are you going to the prom?"  
  
"We can't, Beck. Momma would say no."  
  
"So what? We could just say that I'm going with you."  
  
Carrie laughed.  
  
"Still it would be a problem because there's gonna be boys there."  
  
"So what about boys? The girls are going too..."  
  
Carrie stopped in her tracks; her eyes wide with shock.  
  
"What?" she said.  
  
"Look," said Carrie, pointing.  
  
On the girls' lockers were in large red letters: CARRIE AND BECKY WHITE SUCK DICK  
  
Neither of the girls said anything when they saw the graffiti.  
  
Her body temperature jumped to a hundred. She could hear Chris's voice in her head, laughing and she could see her face and her stupid bitch friends burning in a red fiery image, laughing and pointing. The room became sweltering hot...Becky slowly turned around, seeing Chris and her dumb friends, only a few paces way, laughing and pointing.  
  
(like fire? like playing with it...NO! No fire! I swore! back off! back off...)  
  
Becky walked slowly towards Chris, smiling a false smile. "Hello, Chris Ho-Gensen," she said, cheerfully, but the room was getting hotter. "I got your wonderful message that you left me."  
  
"Oh, you did, freak?" said Chris, sarcastically.  
  
"You know, since you left me such a nice message, isn't it custom to return the message to the messenger? Well, I'm returning it, and this is it."  
  
There was a fast swipe that came across Chris's face, next a crack coming from inside. Chris screamed and fell to her knees; she was bleeding at the mouth. Then, she spat out a tooth. She saw the tooth and charged at Becky. She struck Becky hard, catching her ear; her ear began to bleed.  
  
"Oh!" Becky said, sarcastically. "You wanna play rough, do you?" The room got hotter than before. "Well, I'll be glad to play that way."  
  
She sprang onto Chris like an angry tiger and both of them landed on the floor with a thud. They scratched, punched, and pulled hair. Becky dug her fingernails in Chris's face, hoping to draw blood.  
  
"Bitch fight," screeched Norma, excitedly.  
  
"Fight, fight, fight..." chanted the boys. Soon the chanting spread and the entire student body formed a ring around the two angry girls who held up their angry fists.  
  
Chris sprung forward, pinned Becky down and punched her face with heavy blows. Her hot face began to sweat and twinge with pain, and blood trickled down her nose. She spied Chris's dangly silver earrings that jingled as she punched...  
  
(metal and heat...)  
  
Becky grabbed Chris's earrings with her fingers. She shrieked loudly and her earlobes turned tomato red.  
  
"YOU BURNED ME!!" Chris screamed. "YOU BITCH!"  
  
She seized Becky's thin throat and began to choke her. Becky gagged and struggled to push her off. Becky seized a handful of Chris's beautiful hair and pulled with a death grip, ripping out a fistful of it.  
  
"AIEEEEE!!" Chris screamed. "You FUCK!" She seized a handful of Becky's hair with two fists.  
  
"All right, all right, ladies," said Miss Collins. "Break it up. Break it up."  
  
"She started it!" Chris pointed accusingly at her with a red fingernail.  
  
"I did not!" Becky said. "You did, bitch! You vandalized our lockers!"  
  
"Come with me, ladies to the office."  
  
As they walked out of the office, Chris stared angrily at Becky and she stared back with hate as well. Both were bruised, bloody, and hair was scattered and faces scratched.  
  
"Psycho-bitch!" she whispered.  
  
"Dirty pussy cunt!" she whispered back. "And if I had killed you, I would've written my name in your blood."  
  
She would have detention after school.  
  
From The Shadow Exploded (p. 23)  
  
Becky sat in her detention. She heard Miss Collins's voice in the back of her head, calling the girls from Period One gym class by name, in alphabetical order, last name.  
  
"Line up, girls," she said. "Right now. On your feet right now! Katie, Alice, face front! You too, Chris."  
  
Chris turned around from Norma and Jessica, chewing gum.  
  
"And spit out that gum," said Miss Collins.  
  
"Where should I put it, Miss Collins?" she said, smiling sugar sweetly, putting on her innocent angel actress face.  
  
"You can choke on it for all I care," she replied nastily, getting in her face. "Just get it out of your mouth."  
  
Chris took a piece of paper and put her gum on it. Collins paced back and forth in front of the girls. Norma Watson was smiling almost ready to burst into laughter.  
  
"Wipe that smirk off your face, Norma," she said, sharply and she did it obediently, looking down ashamed.  
  
Collins had not been able to get the image of Carrie out of her mind yesterday, Carrie screaming, blubbering, a wet napkin plastered squarely in the middle of her pubic hair. And Becky, oh, Becky and her fight with Chris! Red faced, angry, sweating, Becky...eyes wide open and glittering, nostrils flared, teeth clenched, pearly saliva dripping like a mad dog, jugular vein flicking in her temple—and her own sick, angry reaction.  
  
The other girls sucked in their breath and winced and stared at the floor. It was getting out of hand.  
  
"Now, I want you to know that you did a really shitty thing yesterday and today," she began. "A really shitty thing."  
  
Chris Hargensen sneered at the floor. The rest of the girls were looking miserably at anything but their gym instructor, for none of them heard a teacher call anything shitty. Helen let out a loud giggle.  
  
"Did any of you stop to think that Carrie or Becky White had feelings? Did any of you ever stop to think?"  
  
No reply from the girls.  
  
"No, I guess not. You're thinking about your dates and the prom, right? So, I guess you can take your pick, Chris. Who's the lucky guy?"  
  
"Billy Nolan," Chris Hargensen said, smiling.  
  
"What? I'm sorry. I didn't hear you."  
  
"Billy Nolan," she said a bit louder.  
  
"Louder."  
  
"Billy Nolan." Her voice was irritated.  
  
""Well, isn't he the lucky one," Miss Collins remarked. She turned to Sue. "And how about you, Sue? Who's taking you?"  
  
Sue's face looked guilty. "Tommy Ross," she said quietly. A sear of guilt quaked inside.  
  
Collins put her hands on her hips. "My idea of punishment for this little trick you pulled was three days suspension and refusal of your prom tickets."  
  
Several of the girls looked at each other and mumbled unhappily.  
  
"What?" exclaimed Norma and Chris, looking at each other with shock.  
  
"That would've hit you where you live," Collins continued. "But, the office has decided one week's detention."  
  
Spontaneous sighs came out.  
  
"But, there's a catch. It's going to be my detention." The girls looked shocked and groaned. "Everyday, after school, on the field."  
  
"I'm not coming," said Chris, lips thinned across her teeth.  
  
"That's up to you, Chris. That's up to all of you. Punishment for skipping detention is going to be three days' suspension and refusal of your prom tickets. Clear?"  
  
Nobody said anything.  
  
"Right. Change up. And think about what I said."  
  
She left.  
  
"I'm not coming!" said Chris.  
  
"Are you sure? I don't want to miss out on the prom," said Norma.  
  
"Oh, come on girls, you're..." but no one would listen to her. "Oh...fuck!"  
  
As the weeks went by, Miss Collins did indeed run those girls ragged. Becky smiled, satisfied with the punishment they were getting. While they were running in place, Miss Collins shouted, "One-two-one-two-one-two. Stretch! One-two-one-two. Bend! One-two-one-two."  
  
A few hours later, she said, having the girls run in place. "Lift those knees up, ladies! One-two-one-two-one-two."  
  
"She can't get away with this!" she whispered to Sue.  
  
"Let it go, Chris," Sue sighed, exasperated.  
  
"Like hell I will," she replied through her gritted teeth.  
  
Chris stopped running and so did the other girls. Collins saw that no one was running in place.  
  
"Detention's not over yet, Hargensen," she said.  
  
"It is for me," Chris replied, exasperated.  
  
"There's still ten minutes left."  
  
"Stick them up your a..."  
  
But just as she was about to finish her sentence, Miss Collins marched up to Chris and slapped her hard across the face; the slap made a sound like a whip cracking. Chris shrieked and a red handprint slowly began to appear on her face. The girls let out gasps of shock when they heard the loud crack of her hand swiping across Chris's smooth cheek.  
  
"You can't hit us!" she screamed, tears pricking her eye, mascara running. "I'll see you'll get canned for this! See if you don't, you bitch!"  
  
"One more word out of you and I'll hurl you onto the ground!" said Collins, grabbing her by the collar.  
  
She yanked away from Collin's grip and turned to the girls and said, "She can't get away with this! If we all stick together we can...Norma?"  
  
Norma shook her head 'no'.  
  
"Helen?" she asked.  
  
Helen shook her head 'no' also.  
  
"Sue?" she said, desperately.  
  
"Shut up, Chris," said Sue. "Just shut up."  
  
"This isn't over," Chris screamed at Collins. "This isn't over by a long shot." She walked off the field, sobbing and her cheek throbbing.  
  
"You're out of the prom, Hargensen!" Miss Collins called. To the girls, "Well, show's over. In place...one-two-one-two..."  
  
Her voice faded out.  
  
From The Flame Exploded (p. 32)  
  
After detention, Becky walked home, all alone. Why would Chris think that she burned her? It was an impossibility to burn someone just by touching someone's earrings. Maybe she was mistaken and thought that she pulled them. She smiled, happy that she had knocked a tooth out of Chris' beautiful mouth.  
  
"Hey, kid!" a voice whispered from an alley. "Want some coke?"  
  
"Show yourself," she demanded.  
  
The man stepped out of the alley. He was an ugly man of thirty with an unshaven face, dirty tattered clothes, snotty drippy red nose, and he was scratching his head and his arms, which were red, he was a junkie.  
  
"I'll give you a bag for a dollar," he said, smiling a rotten, toothless grin; his gums were black and he drooled when he spoke.  
  
"I don't have a dollar," said Becky.  
  
"How 'bout a dime?"  
  
She searched her sweater pocket and discovered she did have a dime.  
  
"Hand it over."  
  
She paid him the dime and took the bag from his dirty hand. She took a pinch of cocaine and sniffed it hard.  
  
"Wow!" he said. "You sure do look desperate. Something bad happen today at school?"  
  
"Yea. This snobby bitch vandalized on my locker. She wrote 'suck dick' on it. So, I beat the shit out of her."  
  
"What was her name?"  
  
"Hargensen. Chris Hargensen."  
  
"I know her father."  
  
"Do you?"  
  
"Yes...he got my ass in jail for drug possession."  
  
"Regular ol' fucker, huh?"  
  
"Sure is. Spent two years in jail 'cause I sold coke to some little kids. Silk assed son of a bitch. But, I'm glad you beat her up. She probably deserved it. She's probably exactly like her daddy."  
  
Becky laughed and sniffed her cocaine again. Her head was now beginning to spin and her heart rate was fluttering and her cheeks flushed.  
  
"Say," he said. "How old are you, kid?"  
  
"Why?"  
  
"How 'bout I fuck you for a quarter? Or maybe blow me for nothing?"  
  
"Why not? I've always wanted a ride all the way to China." Becky laughed.  
  
"Well, maybe later..." he said, his smile faded.  
  
"Why not now?"  
  
"Uh..."  
  
"I know why! You think I'm too young, right?"  
  
The dealer said nothing. She sniffed some more cocaine and didn't say anything for a while. She sniffed a few more times. Now, she was sweating, head spinning faster, blood was hot, and her nose was red and snotty. Becky sniffed again.  
  
"What's your name, kid?"  
  
"Becky White."  
  
"Becky White? Carrie White's little sis?" He laughed. "Ol' prayin' Becky!"  
  
Becky's hand sprang forward and grabbed the dealer's testicles, digging her little pointy daggers into the soft tissue; his face twisted into a grimace of pain.  
  
"Don't ever," Becky said angrily; it started to get hot, "call me 'prayin' Becky' 'cause I don't pray. Understand? Give me a fuckin' sign that you understand, you crazy fuck. 'Cause if you don't, I'll set your fuckin' balls on fire."  
  
"I'm sorry," the dealer squeaked loudly. "I didn't mean to!"  
  
Becky let go of his balls; the dealer leaned forward and groaned, cupping his sore balls. Becky continued to sniff the bag.  
  
"Hey, hey! Take it easy, he squeaked. "You'll kill yourself, kid."  
  
"That's the whole point," Becky replied, super drugged. "You don't know what my life is like. You don't live a theomaniac mother who thinks she's God or Jesus...or I dunno, the Virgin Mary." She laughed a drugged laugh. "She thinks everything around is a sin. When you see me, you think to yourself, 'Oh, poor, pathetic praying Becky White. She can't do anything 'cause everything is a sin. Can't even fuck a man 'till she's wed 'cause it's a fuckin sin.'"  
  
Suddenly, Becky felt really sick. Her head was spinning, hands shaking madly, her blood pressure was sky high, her heart beat faster than a hummingbird's wings on soda pop, her nose ran with snot and was red, her black eyes were watery, and her stomach was sick. Her stomach declared mutiny and she threw up on the sidewalk.  
  
"I told you, kid," the dealer said. "That you were gonna make yourself sick."  
  
"Blow yourself," she said, sickly. She puked again. "Well, thanks for the coke. I'll back for more." She handed the bag back to the dealer and shuffled home sickly. "And I'll be back for the fucking too."  
  
As she walked home, all of Carlin Street spun fast, the voices inside and out her head echoed loudly, giving her a headache, her eyes were wet, and the colors of the environment became blurry. She was sweating and clutching her sick stomach and staggered home. Once she reached the steps of her house, she collapsed on the steps, sick and high. Momma opened the door.  
  
"Where have you been, Rebecca?" she demanded.  
  
"I was talking to God," she replied, so drugged and sick. "I told him not to let you into heaven because of your stupid fanatic shit and He told me that you need to come back to fuckin' reality."  
  
"You are indeed a wicked, wicked child! Go to the closet and pray."  
  
She puked in the bushes. "You're making me sick and you're giving me a fucking headache."  
  
Momma grabbed Becky by the shoulders, digging her nails into her shoulder. She delivered blows to her face.  
  
"Wicked, evil, spawn of Satan," she said; she delivered each blow with each syllable. "Jezebel, Herodias, Salome!"  
  
Becky looked at Momma with her angry black eyes glittering. "I may be all of those women that you called me," she said angrily. "But, I know what you did..." She paused for a minute to catch her breath and then said, "You SLUT!" the spit sprayed in Momma's face.  
  
Momma's eyes turned round with shock. "You dare say such things to me, Rebecca White!"  
  
"I know what you did! Before you were married, you spread your skimpy legs and fucked Daddy."  
  
"Rebecca, stop it! That's not true!"  
  
"Don't you lie to me, Momma! You know it and I know it. Every night, Daddy's bed, Daddy's bed, Daddy's bed, squeak, squeak, squeak, fucking him, with Daddy rollin' on top of you, sinless Momma...fucking, fucking, fucking..."  
  
"Shut up! SHUT UP!" Momma screamed, covering her ears.  
  
"YOU FUCKIN SHUT UP, YOU SLUT!" she slapped Momma hard across the face. She shrieked from the slap. The room was now 104 degrees. The water in the sink boiled.  
  
(like fire, Momma? like hot, beautiful, orange yellow fire? beautiful when it's small but deadly when big)  
  
The room was now 110 degrees that the milk was hot and boiling, the butter was a yellow boiling puddle, and there was a slight smell of smoke from the floorboards.  
  
Becky screamed a high-pitched scream and began to destroy everything in her path. She threw books, knocked over tables and chairs, smashed glass figurines and the crucifix that hung on the wall, threw pictures of Jesus and the Virgin Mary, etc. Her blood was hot, her body temperature was 105.2 degrees, her eyes glittered madly and pearls of saliva dribbled from her mouth, her hands tightened into fists, her hair floated and sweat dripped.  
  
Momma began to scream the Exorcism prayer over Becky's screams.  
  
Carrie ran down the stairs and saw her mad sister, screaming, the room was hotter than ever. She knew that when Becky was this mad, she could start a fire.  
  
"Beck, no!" said Carrie. "Stop! Calm down."  
  
"Stay away from her, Carrie," said Momma, grabbing her wrist. "She's mad. Satan has taken over her. Pray with me to exorcise her."  
  
(like fire, Momma? i'll show you some pretty fire...fire is beautiful when small, but deadly when big. Push, push...PU-)  
  
Carrie broke free of Momma's hand and ran to her sister who was screaming madly, then with all her strength, she slapped her hard across the face. The hand was smooth, yet strong.  
  
"Becky, calm down. Please!" she said. "Don't do it! Don't light!"  
  
Cupping her sore face, slowly, she began to calm down and was panting with exhaustion. The room dropped to normal room temperature and her bodily functions dropped to normal, yet her nerves and brain were screaming with pain. She trembled and dropped to her knees and broke out into tears.  
  
"I'm sorry, Carrie," she begged, quietly.  
  
"Shhh," said Carrie, holding trembling Becky.  
  
"Round we go," Becky sang quietly, sobbing, her voice equivalent to a five year old child. "The world is spinning. When it stops, it's just beginning..."  
  
Then, Momma grabbed Becky's shoulder, flinging her across the room.  
  
"Nothing will spare you from sound strapping, Rebecca White," she said.  
  
"No! Not a strapping!" Becky begged. "Please, Momma!"  
  
Momma tore off her shirt and Becky kneeled on the ground like a wounded beast, naked and shivering. Now her bra was torn off, revealing tiny breasts with tight pink nipples. Roughly grabbing Becky by the hair, laid her stomach down and bound her hands to the legs of the table, her pale back exposed. Momma took out a leather belt from her room: thick, black, ugly and snake like.  
  
"Momma don't!" said Carrie, running to stop her.  
  
Momma grabbed Carrie, pushed her and locked her in the closet. Carrie pounded on the door, screaming.  
  
"'And Pilate handed Jesus over to be scourged...'" Momma said.  
  
She raised the leather belt and it came with a loud leather slap, burning Becky's skin. Becky willed herself not to scream, but the pain was so great that she could only cry and the scream was stuck in her throat.  
  
The lashes came down horrible and merciless. One, two, three, four, Becky's tears burned.  
  
Five, six, seven, eight, the blood in her back grew hot.  
  
Nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen...  
  
(god have mercy on me!)  
  
Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen nineteen, twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two...  
  
(o god o god!)  
  
Twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty-five, twenty-six, twenty-seven, twenty- eight...  
  
(will you ever stop?)  
  
Twenty-nine, thirty, thirty-one, thirty-two, thirty-three, thirty-four, thirty-five...  
  
(PUSH!)  
  
That's when she felt the belt get hotter as it drew closer to thirty- nine. Once there, the belt began to smoke like a hot gun that had been shot.  
  
"Get to your closet and pray, you wicked girl!"  
  
She threw Becky in there with Carrie, naked, bloody, and miserable. Her eyes were sore and red with tears from crying; her muscles were sore from the beating and her wrists burned from the bindings, her voice hoarse and sore from screaming.  
  
She barely had the strength to pray...Becky had stopped praying on the day that she and Carrie were first laughed at. God, to her, was vengeful, angry, and merciless. She couldn't pray to Mary...Mary, the sweet, merciful Mother of Jesus. She had turned away from her  
  
(I will have my revenge! revenge with heat and flame)  
  
Becky lay on the hard wooden floor, Jesus on the cross staring at her, giving her a sense of paranoia. The room got darker...  
  
After the six hours in the closet, Carrie soothed Becky's welts with cool cloths. She could feel her hands trembling as she looked upon the welts: swollen, red, and ugly.  
  
"Oh, Becky, why did you do that?" Carrie said, near weeping.  
  
"I couldn't help it," she sniffled, quietly. She hissed in pain as another cool cloth was placed upon her sore back.  
  
"Is everything you said about Momma and Daddy true? How do you know?"  
  
"It is and I just do."  
  
Becky closed her wet red eyes, slipping into the darkness of her unconsciousness, still feeling Carrie's trembling fingers soothing her sore welts, which seemed to fade out of her mind... It wasn't until hours later she saw and heard something in that darkness...  
  
There were the sounds of high-pitched screams, glass shattering, water spraying, and electricity buzzing in the dark. There was the smell of smoke, burnt flesh, and a coppery smell of blood. And oh! Heat! There was heat that made Becky sweat. Hot enough to melt a tattoo, hotter than a volcano. Fire!  
  
Becky woke up, still sweaty and shaky. The voices were gone, the smell of fire, blood, and burnt flesh was gone, and so were the voices. But one question remained...what was that she had seen in the dark? 


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter VII  
  
From The Files of Rebecca White: Clairvoyance or Coincidence? (p. 11)  
  
Becky could hear her father, John Hargensen, attorney at law, talking in Mr. Morton's office. He was a serious looking man, dressed neatly in a suit and hair combed smoothly.  
  
(spoiled little brat!)  
  
She could hear Mr. Morton and Mr. Hargensen talking:  
  
"Apparently," said Mr. Hargensen. "I am here because my daughter was manhandled by her gym teacher, Miss Rita Collins. And verbally abused, I'm afraid. I believe the term Miss Collins used in connection with my daughter was 'shitty' and slapping her across the face."  
  
"Miss Collins was reprimanded."  
  
Mr. Hargensen's smile faded. "I'm afraid a reprimand will not be sufficient. I believe this young lady's first year in a teaching capacity?"  
  
"Yes, she is eminently satisfactory."  
  
"Your apparent definition of eminently satisfactory includes hitting students and having the ability to curse like a sailor?"  
  
"As a lawyer, you must be familiar with the term in the school title in loco parentis. If not, I'd advise you to check Monondock Consolidated School District vs. Cranepool or..."  
  
"I'm familiar with the concept," said Mr. Hargensen. "Are you familiar with District #4 vs. David, that deals with verbal and physical abuse?"  
  
"I am indeed familiar with it."  
  
"Let's not quote cases at each other, Mr. Morton," said Mr. Hargensen. We're busy men. My daughter is at home and she will stay there Monday and Tuesday; that will complete her three-day suspension. All that I ask are two things: One, prom tickets for my daughter. A girl's senior prom is very important. Two, no contract renewal for Miss Collins."  
  
"So court is alternative if I don't agree to your demands?"  
  
"I understand that the school committee hearing will proceed to that. But yes, court will be a final result for you."  
  
"For physical and verbal abuse?"  
  
"Basically."  
  
"Are you aware, Mr. Hargensen, that your daughter and her peers threw sanitary napkins and tampons at a girl who was having her first menstrual period who was under the impression that she was bleeding to death?"  
  
Mr. Hargensen flushed. "I hardly think such allegation is at issue..."  
  
"This girl, Carrietta White," interrupted Mr. Morton, "was told to 'plug it up' and was subjected to various obscene gestures. Doesn't that sound like physical and verbal abuse? Sounds like it to me."  
  
"My daughter also told me that some girl physically attacked my daughter, causing her to lose a tooth..."  
  
"The girl who attacked your daughter was Carrie White's sister, Rebecca..."  
  
"Somehow...I don't know, burned her ears, she called my daughter a 'dirty pussy cunt' after the fight and threatened to kill her..."  
  
"Becky White explained to me that she was trying to protect her sister. But she was punished with a detention."  
  
"I don't intend to sit here and argue about half-truths. I know my daughter well..."  
  
"Here." Morton reached into the wire IN basket across the desk. "I doubt that if you know your daughter represented in these cards. If you did, you might realize that it's time for a trip to the woodshed. It's time that you snubbed her close before she does anymore major damage to anyone else."  
  
"You aren't..."  
  
"Bates, four years," Morton interrupted. "Tested for an IQ of a hundred and forty. Eighty-three average. Accepted into Oberlin. However, she's had seventy-four assigned detentions. Twenty of those are for harassment for misfit students. I understand that Chris' cliques calls with her friends...they find it quite hilarious. She skipped out on fifty-one of those assigned detentions. At Chamberlain Junior High, she was suspended for putting a firecracker in one girl's shoe...the most recent was vandalized Becky and her Carrie's locker and a catfight with Becky. We're talking about your daughter, Mr. Hargensen. Does that tell you anything, Mr. Hargensen?"  
  
"Yes," said Mr. Hargensen, his face flushed. "It means I'll see you in court."  
  
"Let it be court then," said Mr. Morton. "The same umbrella that covers your daughter also covers Carrie and Becky White. And the minute you file these damages on the grounds of verbal and physical abuse, we will cross- file against your daughter on the same grounds for Carrie and Becky White."  
  
Mr. Hargensen's mouth dropped wide open. "You won't get away with this cheap gimmick like this..."  
  
From The Shadow Exploded: Clairvoyance, Telepathy, or Out-of-Body Experience? (p. 12)  
  
It was May seventeenth. Becky was sleeping in her bed...dreaming maybe...  
She felt strange...she felt her body was colder than ice. She looked at a hairbrush on the bureau.  
  
Flex. Carrie's voice said.  
  
She was lifting the hairbrush. It was heavy. It was like lifting a barbell with very weak arms. The hairbrush slid to the edge of the bureau and it dangled like it was tied to an invisible string. Her eyes were slits. Veins pulsed hard in her temples. Her respiration dropped to sixteen breaths per minute, blood pressure was 190/100, and heart rate was 140, and temperature dropped to 94.3 degrees. A doctor would have indeed been interested in what was going on with her.  
  
Carefully she set the hairbrush down. Good. Last night she had dropped it.  
  
She blinked her eyes again and rocked. Physical function was normal again; her respiration speeded until she was nearly panting. Clear your mind, relax.  
  
"Carrie?" said her mother's voice.  
  
(she's getting interference like a radio when you turn on the blender good good)  
  
"Have you said your prayers?"  
  
"I'm saying them..." Carrie said, only it felt as if Becky were talking rather than her.  
  
Becky felt cold and sweaty after she said that.  
  
Becky waited until midnight to sneak out of her bed. She quietly tiptoed across the floor towards her sleeping sister. The floorboards creaked beneath her pale bare feet as she treaded upon them. She saw Carrie sleeping in her bed. She reminded Becky of a wretched angel that had fallen from heaven, abused and used. Becky crawled into bed next to her sister, slipping between the warm sheets. Carrie opened her eyes, seeing Becky, looking sad, lonely and frightened. She smiled at Becky and she smiled back.  
  
"Stay," whispered Carrie.  
  
"Together forever," whispered Becky.  
  
From The Files of Rebecca White: Clairvoyance or Coincidence? (p. 15)  
  
Chris and Billy Nolan were driving down the road, him staring at her braless breasts and her nipples puckered through the material of her sweater  
  
(slut)  
  
Billy slugged down a beer that Freddy Overlook tossed him as he drove next to him in the opposite lane. Seeing a police car in the rear view, he panicked.  
  
"Oh shit!" he exclaimed, tossing the beer on the floor at Chris's feet, splashing beer on her skirt and her legs.  
  
"Watch it, you stupid shit!" she screeched.  
  
He drove in his car, pretending to be cool and not drunk. The police car drove away.  
  
"Don't call me that, will you?" said Billy.  
  
"Well, look what you did!" said Chris, showing the mess on her skirt.  
  
He just laughed.  
  
"Stupid shit."  
  
He slapped her.  
  
"I told you not to call me that!" he said.  
  
"Look out!" exclaimed Chris.  
  
Screeches of brakes from the other car and Billy pulled into the lane he was driving in.  
  
"Dumb punk!" the driver shouted.  
  
"Don't call me that, will you?" Billy said.  
  
"You wanna get us killed?" Chris said. They were quiet for a few minutes and she murmured, "Dumb shit."  
  
"You fuck!" Billy said angrily, doing a U-turn and going into the opposite lane.  
  
They arrived at the bar and Billy prepared to get out.  
  
"Don't hurry so," said Chris, stopping him.  
  
"Don't hurry," Billy replied, rolling his eyes. "That's what I'm trying to do. Get away from you."  
  
He found her sucking on his fingers, her green eyes glittering seductively.  
  
"Oh, shit," he said.  
  
They kissed, his hands crushing her breasts. She pushed him away. He laughed and tried to kiss again. She pushed him away again.  
  
"Jesus Christ, what the hell's wrong with you?" he demanded.  
  
"Will you just wait a moment?" Chris said, brushing her hair.  
  
"But we do this all the time. You don't like it, do you?"  
  
"Bullshit."  
  
"NO?" he smiled. "Maybe you'd like this." He tried to put his hands between her thighs.  
  
"No." She pushed his hands away from her.  
  
He tried to do it again. Chris slapped and fought back to keep his hands away.  
  
"Stop it, you dumb shit!"  
  
He slapped her really hard; her hair flew in her face and a sting pricked her skin from the blow. A large, red handprint slowly began to appear on her cheek  
  
"I thought I told you never to call me that!" he said angrily. "You know, you are totally fucked up! That's it! I'm convinced."  
  
He sat there, staring straight ahead, fuming and red in the cheeks.  
  
"Billy, come here," said Chris seductively. Then, lightly kissed his lips. "Billy..." she whispered. "I want you to do something for me, something important." She was now unbuttoning his shirt all the way to his navel.  
  
"Billy, Billy, Billy..." she moaned, going lower. There was the sound of a zipper unzipping. Chris dipped her head down there, moaning, her hands pressing his chest, her mouth on his swollen manhood, suckling while he grasped the back of the driver seat, arching his back, giving her better access.  
  
"Billy, Billy, Billy...I hate Carrie White."  
  
"Who?" he asked, looking down at Chris, stupidly. 


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8  
  
From Shadow Exploded (p. 34 )  
  
As Carrie was in the library on Thursday afternoon when:  
  
"Hi, Carrie," said Tommy Ross.  
  
She looked up from her books, startled, slamming her books shut. She was looking with a startled expression.  
  
"Hi," she said, startled.  
  
"What you doing?"  
  
"Um...reading."  
  
"What are you reading?"  
  
"Um...it's about...sewing."  
  
"Sewing. That's cool." Changing the subject, Tommy let out a sigh and said, "Listen, if you don't have a date for the prom, would you like to go with me?" said Tommy.  
  
She blinked, and as she did so, a strange thing happened. The time it took to happen could have been no more than the doorway to a second, but afterward he had no trouble recalling. Like déjà vu. Then, it was gone.  
  
"What?"  
  
"The Spring Ball," he said, a little shaken. "It's next Friday and I know it's this is late notice but..." With that, Carrie ran away. "Wait! Carrie!"  
  
Carrie sat down all alone. Miss Collins came down the steps, seeing Carrie, moping, her mussed up, blonde hair hanging in her freckled face.  
  
"Hey, Carrie, what's wrong?" she asked, sitting next to her.  
  
"Nothing," said Carrie, quietly, shaking her head.  
  
"Was it one of the girls?"  
  
A shake of the head.  
  
"Did one of the girls do something to you?"  
  
Another shake of the head.  
  
"Well, why don't you tell me what's wrong? You can trust me, Carrie."  
  
"I got invited to the prom," she said quietly.  
  
"Oh!" Miss Collins laughed. "That's great. But what's wrong?"  
  
"Tommy Ross asked me."  
  
"That's even better. He's real cute, huh?"  
  
"I know who he goes around with. He's trying to trick me again."  
  
"No. Maybe he meant it."  
  
"No, he didn't."  
  
"Listen, Carrie, there's this attitude you have about yourself. You're always walking around moping and your hair over your eyes. I mean, look at your sister. She's really pretty."  
  
"I wish I could be as pretty as she is."  
  
"Your sister tells me that you're even prettier than she is. Come on, let's take a look at you, you big silly."  
  
They walked into the bathroom, looking in the mirror. Miss Collins pulled back her hair, showing her face.  
  
"Look at yourself, Carrie," she said, smiling. "Now, that's a pretty girl. Look at your eyes. You could bring it out with a little mascara."  
  
Carrie felt herself smiling.  
  
"And your lips. You have such pretty lips. Maybe some lipstick."  
  
Carrie's cheeks became warm. Beck's right, I am pretty.  
  
"And your cheekbones. And look at your hair. You have beautiful hair. Maybe you could fix it, you know, put a little curl in it. I think that would work."  
  
~  
  
"So, I heard," said Becky, smiling, bouncing her bottom on the bed.  
  
"Heard what?" Carrie said, blushing.  
  
"You got asked to the prom by Tommy Ross, didn't you?" she smiled with glee.  
  
"I already said no."  
  
"What? How could you refuse? That was really nice of him..."  
  
"There's only one problem you're forgetting: Momma."  
  
"Oh, come on, Car! You've got to take a stand against her. If you don't go, Momma wins, you see?"  
  
Soon, a knock at the door came. Of course, Momma was resting in her room.  
  
"Go!" Becky whispered.  
  
Carrie went down the stairs and answered the door while Becky listened from upstairs. The radio was on playing the religious station, choruses singing praises to God and Jesus.  
  
"Hi, Carrie," she heard Tommy's voice.  
  
Carrie hid in front of the door, talking through the screen.  
  
"What are you doing here?"  
  
"Aren't you gonna invite me in?"  
  
Carrie shook her head.  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"M-m-Momma's resting."  
  
"Oh," he said, nodding.  
  
"So, do you still want to go to the prom with me?"  
  
"I told you no already."  
  
"C'mon, Carrie..."  
  
"I can't!" Her voice was high and she shook her head violently.  
  
"Carrie!" said Momma's voice.  
  
"Why not, Carrie?"  
  
"Why are you doing this to me?"  
  
"I dunno, because you liked my poem."  
  
"Please go!"  
  
"Not until you say yes."  
  
"I told you that I can't!"  
  
"Carrie!" Momma's voice said again.  
  
"Yes you can...and I'm not leaving until you say yes."  
  
Carrie sighed with reluctance. "All right. Now, go, please!"  
  
"I'll pick you up at eight," but Carrie slammed the door in his face, running.  
  
~  
  
She watched Carrie lying on her bed, staring at the ceiling.  
  
Flex. Becky heard her mind say.  
  
She saw the bureau rise into the air, trembling a bit and it rose until it touched the ceiling. She lowered it. Lifted it. Lowered it. Lifted it. Now the bed, complete with her weight. Up. Down. Up. Down. Just like an elevator. She was hardly tired at all... She communicated telepathically to Carrie:  
  
(your powers, carrie, they're flowering)  
  
[Make it hot, Becky]  
  
Becky concentrated hard. Slowly, the room grew hot like a burner that had just been turned on; now, it was hotter than an oven. Beads of sweat formed at the girls' foreheads and the single window in their bedroom began to fog. There was a faint smell of steam and soon, there was a smoky smell, coming from the floorboards.  
  
"Carrie, Becky, supper!" called Momma.  
  
"We're coming, Momma," said Carrie. I'm not afraid of her. Her mind said.  
  
From The Medical Files of Rebecca White: Clairvoyance or Coincidence? (p. 12)  
  
"I don't know how I knew about it," Becky said, staring at the glass of water on the table. "I just don't know."  
  
"So somehow, in an non-physical way, you knew about what was going to happen to Carrie on Prom Night?" said Mike.  
  
"I did. But, I just don't know how..."  
  
~  
  
Becky ate her dinner, yet she felt cold again. The rain pattered down hard. She heard the sound of a car driving up a driveway...  
  
They were flashing past the No Trespassing signs on either side of the fence. There were seven people: Chris, her boyfriend, Billy Nolan, and his friends Willie and Freddy. Billy shifted his car into neutral and turned off the ignition and pushed it up the Henty driveway. Then, shifted it with the parking brake and they got out of the car. There was now the sound of tools clinking in a toolbox.  
  
"One hell of a risk for a joke," said Freddy.  
  
"You want out now?" said Billy.  
  
"No."  
  
"The bastard's going to shit where he stands when he comes back here and gets a look," said Willie with glee.  
  
Freddy was swinging the nine-pound sledgehammer experimentally with one hand. The other boys were gathered around Billy as he opened the trunk, taking out a gas tank. They were carrying a ladder walking along the tall wall of painted pigs.  
  
The four of them walked towards the hog pen, their respiration shortened with excitement.  
  
"Look at this," said Willie.  
  
"What?" Billy demanded, annoyed.  
  
"All these pigs."  
  
"What?"  
  
"All these painted pigs."  
  
"I went out with a girl who modeled for this painting," said Freddy. "She was a real pig."  
  
Willie and Freddie laughed.  
  
"Shut up!" said Billy.  
  
Once over the fence, Freddy began to laugh, scaring the pigs in the pen.  
  
"Doan worry, piggies, doan worry, we're gonna bash your heads in and you woan have to worry about the bomb anymore." Freddy said.  
  
Billy took the sledgehammer from him and looked at Willie questioningly, who held the long broad butcher knife.  
  
Freddy was crooning and grinning, feeding the remains of potato chips to the pigs. He scratched the bristly hairs on his chin.  
  
"Will you quit fooling around and get it done?" Billy yelled.  
  
"We should give 'em time to burp," said Freddy, laughing.  
  
"Will you shut up and get it over with?"  
  
"I can't," he said sickly, handing him the hammer. "You."  
  
"Oh! I knew it!" Billy said, exasperated. "Gimme that and move out of the way, you pig! You fuck up!"  
  
The sledge came flashing down. There was a sound that reminded him of the time he and Freddy dropped a pumpkin off Clairdge Road overpass which crossed 495 west of town.  
  
"Do it! Do it!" Chris screamed as each blow came down.  
  
The sow dropped dead; its tongue protruding, eyes still open and potato chips stuck to its snout.  
  
Willie giggled. "She didn't even have time to burp."  
  
"Do it quick, Willie," said Billy.  
  
Willie slid between the slats, lifted the pig's head—the glazing eyes looked at the crescent with blankness—and slashed.  
  
The flow of blood was immediate and startling. The boys jumped back with cries of disgust as well as Chris.  
  
Billy held the gas tank under the main flow. The tank filled up rapidly and he set it aside. A rank, coppery smell hung in the air and Billy was slimed with blood to the forearms.  
  
Carrying the tank to the car, his mind made a dim, symbolic connection. Pig blood. That was good. Chris was right. It was really good.  
  
Pig blood for a pig.  
  
He nestled it in the trunk and slammed the lid. "Let's go."  
  
From The Shadow and Flame Exploded (p. 30)  
  
Thunderclaps crashed and rain pattered against the window. Candles gleamed beneath the tapestry of the Last Supper. Becky stared at her food, avoiding eye contact with Momma. She picked at her pie with her fork, her stomach feeling sick after her vision, knowing what they had in mind.  
  
"You haven't touched your apple cake, girls," said Momma, looking up from her tract she had been perusing while she drank from her teacup. "It's homemade."  
  
"It gives me pimples, Momma," said Carrie.  
  
"I'm not really hungry," Becky said, quietly, playing with her food.  
  
"Your pimples are the Lord's way of chastising you, Carrie."  
  
Becky rolled her eyes, exasperated.  
  
Should I tell her? Carrie mouthed, looking at her sister.  
  
Tell her, Becky mouth quietly.  
  
"Momma?"  
  
"Yes?"  
  
Carrie plunged; then looked at her sister, "Momma, please say that I got to try to get along with people." "What's this all about, Carrie? Have you been showering with the other girls again?" Her eyes became slits with dots in them.  
  
"I've been invited to the Prom."  
  
Momma was staring at her with those wide my-ears-are-deceiving-me eyes.  
  
"The prom?" she said.  
  
Carrie swallowed the obstruction and only got rid of part of it.  
  
[I'm not afraid of her. O yes I am]  
  
"Yes, Momma. The Senior Prom and you know everyone's going and..."  
  
"It was that teacher that called, wasn't it?" Her voice was soft, but dangerous like a rattlesnake ready to strike.  
  
"Please say I'm not like you. I'm funny...I mean, the kids think I'm funny, but I don't want to be. I want to be normal, like Beck..."  
  
Mrs. White threw her tea in Carrie's face. It was lukewarm, but it couldn't shut off Carrie's words more suddenly if it had been scalding. Carrie sat numbly; Becky gasped with shock, watching the amber fluid dripping from her cheeks onto her white blouse, spreading. Carrie wiped the tea that dripped into her eyes and her drenched hair behind her ears.  
  
"What the hell did you do that for, Momma?" Becky said, incredulously.  
  
"His name's Tommy Ross and he's a really nice boy..."  
  
"No."  
  
"...He's promised to stop in and meet you before and..."  
  
"No!"  
  
"...I've accepted. Momma! I've already accepted!" Carrie pounded her hands on the table, causing the silverware and glasses to shake.  
  
"No! No! No!"  
  
Her eyes darted towards Becky.  
  
"You poisonous, wicked, sinful child!" she screeched and delivered a blow to Becky's face with each syllable she spoke. Becky screamed loudly and a searing pain throbbed in her cheekbones and her nose began to bleed.  
  
"Jesus, Momma, what did I do?" Becky sobbed. "I didn't say anything to her!"  
  
Carrie sat there motionless. Becky, sitting in her chair, teary eyed and nose bleeding. The heat in the kitchen began to intensify even though it was only 8:30 at night.  
  
Mrs. White looked at the girls with an expression half-mad of compassion mixed with hate.  
  
"Get to your closet!" she said.  
  
"No!" Carrie said sharply.  
  
"After all you've been taught..."  
  
"Not everything's bad, Momma. Not everything is a sin."  
  
"Get to your closet and pray for forgiveness!"  
  
"He's a nice boy, Momma. You'd like him Momma..." her voice was equivalent to a child's.  
  
"Boy?" she said quietly, then threw her head back and laughed; this laugh was a high-pitched false laugh. "The boys. Yes, after the blood, the boys come next..." Carrie and Becky covered their ears. Momma grabbed both their wrists pulling them off. "Like sniffing dogs, grinning, slobbering, trying to find out where the smell is..."  
  
"Shut up, Momma!" Becky said. The temperature was now 99 degrees; the butter was melting, looking like a soft bar of gold and the milk in the glasses bubbled quietly.  
  
"You...you, the Heiress of Satan, poisonous goddess, you have poisoned your sister like Herodias did to Salome..." She clawed her daughter's thin, bony shoulder, which was sweaty and hot beneath Momma's cold hand.  
  
"I'm not the poison, Momma," Becky said, blood scalding hot. "You are!"  
  
Another blow to Becky's face, catching her ear and it bled. Now, the milk was boiling and the butter was now a yellow puddle in the tray.  
  
"Leave her alone, Momma," said Carrie. "She did nothing."  
  
Becky looked at Carrie with shock, hearing her sister stand up for her and being assertive to the crazy Gorgon.  
  
Her entire arm swung into the blow, the sound of her palm against Carrie's face was like a flat leather belt being snapped in the air. Carrie remained seated, although her upper body swayed. The mark on her cheek was first white then blood red.  
  
[O I am afraid now O God]  
  
Momma's eyes were large, but blank. Her breathing was rapid, gulping breaths. The clawed hand descended on Carrie and Becky's shoulders hard.  
  
"I've seen it, all right. Oh yes. I have..." Momma seemed in the throes to have a great revelation to destroy them.  
  
"Momma..."  
  
"In cars. Oh, I know where they take you in their cars. City limits. Roadhouses. Whiskey. Smelling...oh! They smell it on you!" Her voice rose to a scream. Tendons stood out in her neck and her head twisted into a question upward rotation.  
  
"Momma, you'd better stop it!"  
  
This seemed to snap her back into reality. Her lips twitched in a kind of elementary surprise and she halted, as if searching for old bearings in a new world.  
  
"You tell him you're not going," she muttered.  
  
"No!"  
  
"You tell him you're not going or you'll never see that boy again."  
  
The room was now 102 as it said on the kitchen thermometer; Becky could see that her sister and Momma were sweating and the candles were melting faster than they were lighted.  
  
"Momma, please talk to me!" Carrie begged, grabbing her arm. "I'm gonna close the windows, storm's coming," she said, shoving her hand off her grip on her arm.  
  
"Momma, sit and talk to me!"  
  
Then, the windows slammed shut and flames on the candles rose to two feet in the air and the glasses of milk burst loudly, splashing hot milk onto the walls and glasses burst into shards. Momma's voice failed her, but she did stand up, her back flattened against the wall, her eyes wide opened.  
  
"We're going, Momma," Carrie whispered. "And nothing you say can change my mind."  
  
"Witches," Momma whispered. "That's Satan's power you both have..."  
  
"It's not Satan, Momma," said Carrie.  
  
"It's us," said Becky.  
  
"If I concentrate hard enough, I can move things."  
  
"And if I too, I can make heat and light fires."  
  
"The Devil is clever..."  
  
"It's not just me, Momma, other people can do it. I read about it."  
  
"It took your father..."  
  
"He left, Momma..."  
  
"The Devil tempted him..."  
  
"No, Momma. He left," said Becky. "With another woman."  
  
"You must renounce this power. You must never use it."  
  
"We're going, Momma," said Carrie quietly. "And things are going to change around here. And I don't want to talk about it anymore."  
Slowly the heat began to decrease and the room was back to normal.  
  
The girls were now in their room sat on her bed.  
  
"Thank you, Becky," she said, hugging her tightly, "for giving me the strength."  
  
Becky smiled. She lay on her mattress that she had placed on the floor. The bruises on her face swelled on her face. The blood from her nose dried above her lip. Becky licked her lips, tasting the combination of snot and blood.  
  
The girls were downstairs using the mannequins to make their dresses while Momma was whispering to herself, rocking. Becky could hear her saying the Lord's Prayer on her hands and knees, eyes closed. They ignored her.  
  
From The Medical Files of Rebecca White: Clairvoyance or Coincidence? (p. 20)  
  
Oh! Becky could see it all...the shadows of Billy and Chris in the gym. She could see the bucket being taken out of the ice chest and the gas tank of blood. And the sounds...ah! The sounds! Hammering, squeaks of pulleys as ropes were attached, and Billy and Chris's high pitched giggles.  
  
Billy stood on the ladder, marked an X on the dusty beams, then placed the bucket on the dusty X. Nobody would look up here because the lights would be shining on the mural and the thrones where the King and Queen would be. Chris held a flashlight and the rope as he threaded it through a pulley, down the mural, and under the stage. After threading the rope, he began to pour the blood from the gas tank into the bucket. Chris was shaking nervously.  
  
"Hold that damn light straight," said Billy as he poured the blood into the bucket.  
  
"Watch it, you stupid shit!" Chris exclaimed as a drop of blood fell on the flashlight. "You're getting blood all over the place."  
  
"Well, you can't even hold that damn light straight."  
  
"Hurry up!" said Chris, impatiently.  
  
"Yes, boss, whatever you say," said Billy, sarcastically.  
  
"Hurry up. I want to go home."  
  
"Keep your tits on. If you cooperate, I'll let you pull the rope." Becky could see that nasty grin.  
  
"I plan on it," she said, grinning back.  
  
Billy tied the rope to the handle, threaded it in the pulley and down under the stage. What to do? How to tell Carrie? She could hear them drive away... 


	9. Part 2: Chapter 1

PART 2: PROM NIGHT  
  
Chapter 1  
  
Becky and Carrie went to the store to pick out some lipstick. They giggled as they put on the samples. They picked out mascara, blush, eye shadow, and concealor for their faces. Now, the shoes: Carrie's white and Becky's were black, both had heels.  
  
The night had come fast. Carrie first put it on that night of May 27, in her room. Becky could remember it so well; the material was silk, the skirt floor length and loose and the waist snug, a soft pink. She liked it...no, loved it.  
  
Becky's own dress was a black silk, it too floor length, making her pale skin look prettier. There was red lace on the V-neck, showing the pale neck and the small, yet shapely breasts that breathed freely, showing taut nipples. It was also backless, showing her pale back with a beautiful curve of her spine; thankfully the bruises from Momma's whipping had gone. On her right wrist was a corsage consisting of bloody red roses with white baby breaths that Carrie had bought her. The tattoo of her name was covered, but Carrie's name was uncovered.  
  
"Beck," said Carrie, seeing her sister in the doorway. "You look absolutely beautiful."  
  
Becky smiled, turning showing her sister her dress, and her cheeks turned pink. "You too, Car."  
  
The girls put on their makeup in front of Carrie's cracked mirror and they helped each other curl each other's hair with a curling iron.  
  
"Red and black," they heard Momma's voice murmur. "I might've known it would those colors."  
  
"It's pink, Momma," said Carrie. "Look what Tommy gave me. Isn't it pretty, Momma?"  
  
She picked up her corsage, which consisted of pink roses with silk ribbon. Becky could see that her eyes were not looking at the corsage...but at her breasts.  
  
"I can see your dirty pillows," Momma said, quietly. "Everyone will. They'll be looking at your body."  
  
"Breasts, Momma. They're called breasts. And every woman has them. Becky told me all about them."  
  
"You dare poison your sister with such sin!" Momma said to Becky, eyes wide open in shock.  
  
"It's not sin," Becky said, calmly; the room became hot. "It's the reality of puberty."  
  
Carrie and Becky put on their lipsticks, looking in the cracked mirror; Becky put on a dark red lipstick and Carrie a nice pink.  
  
"Take off those dresses," Momma said.  
  
"No, Momma," said Carrie and Becky, both exasperated.  
  
"We'll burn them together, Carrie and Rebecca, and pray for forgiveness."  
  
"Momma, shut up!" said Becky.  
  
Soon, a car went by. Carrie ran to the window to see if it was Tommy. No...it was just two cars passing by.  
  
"He's not gonna come," said Momma.  
  
"Yes, he is, Momma," said Carrie.  
  
Momma paced a few times. "No, he's not coming."  
  
"Stop it, Momma! We're nervous enough already."  
  
Her mother reached up and pinched her face, screaming. Then, pulled her hair and scratched, and slapped her face, letting out little cries of pain.  
  
"Momma!" said Becky. "Stop it!"  
  
"Stop hurting yourself, Momma!" said Carrie.  
  
"He's all gonna laugh at you!" she said, her voice high, sobbing. "They're all gonna laugh at you! I know it." She grabbed the girls' arms, digging her fingernails into their bare flesh. The scratch bled a thin line of blood on Momma's cheek.  
  
"Momma, shut up!" said Becky.  
  
"You're not going, neither of you. I'll go downstairs and tell him you're both sick. I'll tell him you changed your mind. We'll stay home together..."  
  
"No!" the girls said together.  
  
Soon, a large flame rose up below Momma's feet, just near her nose. She screeched.  
  
"Satan! The bowels of Hell are opening..." she screamed.  
  
"Sit down!" Carrie screamed. With that, Momma fell backward on the bed, staring at Carrie and Becky with shock.  
  
Becky heard the sound of a car approaching the house, ran to the window to see if it was Tommy. She saw as Tommy got out of the car, walking up the path.  
  
"He's here, Carrie," said Becky.  
  
Carrie and Becky grabbed their silken shawls and were ready to go out and meet Tommy.  
  
"Carrie, Rebecca, listen to me, I..." said Momma.  
  
"Sit down, Momma!" said Carrie and Becky, together. Momma fell back on the bed again. "Just sit there and don't say a word until we're gone," said Carrie. They walked towards the door. "We'll be home early. We love you, Momma."  
  
"And we're sorry," Becky said.  
  
Soon as they walked down the stairs, Becky heard Momma say: "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live."  
  
From The Medical Files of Rebecca White: Clairvoyance or Coincidence? (p. 19)  
  
Tommy pulled into the parking lot by the high school's new wing. He turned off the car and opened the door to get out.  
  
"Wait, Tommy," said Carrie. "Just a second."  
  
"OK," he said, closing the door.  
  
Becky pretended not to listen as they talked.  
  
"Nervous?" he asked.  
  
"A bit," she said. "You know, maybe this was a mistake."  
  
"What? No! Come on, Carrie. You can do this."  
  
Carrie smiled.  
  
"You ready to go in?"  
  
"Yea."  
  
He got out of the car and opened the door, helping both girls out.  
  
The first thing that struck them was glamour. Beautiful silvery stars hung from the ceiling, reminding Becky of a midnight sky. The lights shone on the stars, making them sparkle in every hue. The air was redolent with flowers, girls in dresses that were silk, chiffon, lace, and satin with low backs, scooped bodices showing actual cleavage, with Empire waists. Long skirts, pumps, blinding white dinner jackets, cummerheads, black shoes that shined like the Chrysler Building.  
  
"The mural's nice," said Tommy.  
  
"Yes," Carrie said.  
  
"Want to sit down?"  
  
"Sure," they said.  
  
"Hey, Tommy," said George Dawson, with his date Frieda Jason. "You look queer!" He lunged forward with his fists up, while Tommy tagged him twice in the ribs, laughed, collapsing his guard.  
  
"Don't let it bother you," said Frieda. "If they kill each other, I'll dance with you."  
  
They laughed.  
  
"Why don't you join us, Carrie and Becky?" said Frieda.  
  
"Thanks," said Carrie, smiling  
  
"I really like those dresses," said Frieda. "Where did you two get them?"  
  
"We made them," said Becky.  
  
"No shit!"  
  
Soon as the girls sat down, Tommy went to go get the girls some punch.  
  
"Hi, Carrie and Becky," said a voice behind them. It was Miss Collins.  
  
"Hi, Miss Collins," said Carrie. "You look very pretty."  
  
"Thank you, so do you two."  
  
Carrie felt herself blushing again and dropped her eyes on the table. "It's awfully nice of you to say so. I know I'm not...but really, thank you."  
  
"It's true," said Miss Collins...  
  
While they talked, their voices seemed to fade out from Becky's ears. Everything Becky heard went silent...as if she had gone completely deaf. The voices were softer, yet her body was cold as ice and her muscles were stiff. She could feel it inside...an empty pit in her stomach. She tasted blood and steel in her mouth...what was it? Where was it coming from?  
  
"Becky?" said Carrie.  
  
"Huh?" she said stupidly.  
  
"You all right?"  
  
"Um...yea...I was just daydreaming. Sorry."  
  
"Tommy and I are going to dance. Wanna come?"  
  
"No, thanks. I think I'll watch you."  
  
She watched Tommy and Carrie walk on the dance floor. A song playing softly from the stage and the stars glittering from the ceiling as they danced slowly. She watched as Carrie rested her head on Tommy's shoulder, feeling its warmth and strength.  
  
"I can't do anything, I can't dance or even..."  
  
Becky watched as Tommy leaned forward and kissed Carrie's pink lips, encasing them, tasting them. Becky smiled warmly, her cheeks burned softly and turned pink.  
  
"Tommy?" she heard Carrie's voice.  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"Why are we here?"  
  
"Because it's the prom."  
  
"Why am I here with you?"  
  
"Because I asked you."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"I dunno...maybe because you liked my poem."  
  
"Oh," she said.  
  
"You know, I didn't really write that poem."  
  
"Oh."  
  
She could see them spinning, laughing and smiling. Becky smiled warmly; happy to see that her sister was happy for she had never seen her sister so happy since the day Becky was born, remembering one-year-old Carrie's face looking at baby Becky in the cradle, smiling down at her, touching the soft skin on her face and holding her tiny hand. All that was past...Becky knew that Carrie had found true happiness.  
  
From Inside Her Mind: The Mysterious Mind of Rebecca White (p.23)  
  
Vic Mooney, Class President of the Senior Class, stepped up to the mike and said, "All right, ladies and gentlemen. Please take your seats. It's time for the voting of the king and queen."  
  
Carrie and Tommy sat down with Becky. Carrie picked up the ballot that was on the table and her mouth dropped open after studying it.  
  
"Tommy," she said, quietly. "We're on here."  
  
"Yea, I see," he said. "Want to decline?"  
  
"I don't know. It's your crowd...I don't have a crowd."  
  
"Come on, Car," said Becky. "I mean it's a once in a lifetime thing. It's not like it's going to happen again."  
  
"Beck's right, Carrie," said Tommy. "I mean, if you win, all you do they take your picture for the yearbook and give you a dance to make you look like an idiot."  
  
"So, who do we vote for?" she said.  
  
"Yourselves," Becky said.  
  
"No," said Carrie, "Don't..."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Come on, Carrie," said Tommy, offering her a pencil. "To the devil with false modesty."  
  
"To the devil..." Carrie laughed, and X-ed their names on the ballot...  
  
Her laughter faded out in Becky's mind...so did everyone else fade out. The whole world around her became silent and she felt colder. She went into some kind of trance like state, and images flashed...seeing, smelling, tasting, and hearing. She saw an eye, a green one with mascara darting, a tongue licking lips, hands trembling, heavy breathing (all were in some nervous/excited state)...but oh! The smell! That horrible, coppery smell that made her head spin and her stomach sick...she could taste it too. Blood and steel! And a rope! A long rope leading somewhere to the sky...and a red splash falling from the sky...but where was it all coming from?  
  
From The Shadow Exploded (p. 57)  
  
The house was silent.  
They were gone.  
At night.  
Gone.  
  
Margaret White walked slowly from Carrie's bedroom to the kitchen, pacing around the table. First had come the flow of blood and the filthy fantasies that the Devil had sent with it, from both girls. Then, the power of the Devil had given them. It came at the time of blood and hair on the bodies  
  
(momma, it's not satan it's the reality of puberty)  
  
Oh, she knew the Devil's power. Her grandmother had it...she was able to light fires without stirring from her chair. It made her eyes glow with a kind of witch's light. Sometimes at supper, the sugar bowl would spin madly like a dervish. Whenever it happened, Gram would cackle crazily and make the Sign of the Evil Eye around her.  
  
{Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live}  
  
She died of a heart attack at sixty-six, when Carrie was only a year old and Becky, inside her womb, Momma had gone to Carrie's bedroom, not four weeks after the funeral, and there the child, laughing and gurgling, in her crib.  
  
Margaret had almost killed her then. But Ralph stopped her. He shouldn't have stopped her.  
  
Then, when Becky was born, it had come at the time of her birth when she saw she had birthed Satan's own image: that pale skin covered in the bloody placental membrane, her power...that power he gave her when she screamed and the heat would rise, the Devil gave her the power...the power to make heat and fire. But her eyes, Satan's own ebony black eyes that stared right at Momma. She tried to kill little Becky...sickly, ugly Becky with Satan's eyes. Becky screamed and there was fire! Yellow orange flames that licked her dress hungrily...  
  
(slut!) Becky's voice whispered.  
  
Ten minutes after eight.  
  
She had been able to feel, actually feel, the Devil's power working in both girls. It crawled over you, lifting and pulling and burning like tiny, tickling fingers of evil that made your skin crawl and the hair on your neck stand. She had set out to do her duty again on Carrie, three, and Becky, two, when she caught them looking into the eyes of sin at Satan's slut next door.  
  
(slut slut slut slut slut)  
  
Then the fiery stones came and she had weakened. And the power had risen again after thirteen years. God was not mocked.  
  
(slut slut slut slut slut)  
  
First the blood, then the power  
  
{you sign your name you sign it in blood}  
  
now a boy and dancing and he would take both of them to a roadhouse afterward, to a parking lot and take them into the back seat, take them—  
  
(I know what you did with daddy got in his bed spread your skimpy legs and FUCKED him you slut)  
  
Blood was at the root of it and only blood could expiate it.  
The only way to kill sin, true black sin, was to drown it in the blood of  
  
{they must be sacrificed}  
  
a repentant heart. Surely God understood that, and had laid his finger upon her.  
  
(slut slut slut slut slut) Becky's voice got louder, singing in the tune of Bernard Hermann's 'Twisted Nerve' now.  
  
Eight-thirty.  
  
(slut slut slut slut)  
  
She went to the kitchen, carrots laying on the carving board and the carving knife lying on top. She took a carrot, laid it carefully on the board and raised the knife and whacked at the carrot, cutting it twice and then she missed it...  
  
Whack! Whack! Whack! 


	10. Chapter 2

Chapter II  
  
From The Medical Files of Rebecca White: Clairvoyance or Coincidence? (p. 35)  
  
"Ballots," said Norma Watson, coming around collecting the ballots from each table. "Ballots, thank you very much."  
  
Becky watched her carefully as she collected the ballots. She and Freddy went around collecting ballots. Then, as she watched, Norma and Freddy went to an isolated corner where Freddy and kissed Norma. To her shock, Freddy dropped the ballots and Norma kicked them under the stage and took out false ballots from Freddy's jacket. Norma walked away smiling.  
  
Becky's heart stopped, felt cold again...the blood and steel taste and the rope. It made sense, but not a lot. But who did the eye, tongue, hands, and heavy breathing belong to? She smelt the sweat and heard the heavy breathing.  
  
(conspiracy?)  
  
"Ladies and gentlemen," said Vic Mooney. "I give you..."  
  
The drum rolls echoed.  
  
"Tommy Ross and Carrie White!"  
  
The cheers and claps.  
  
The light shone on the two of them. Carrie looked so happy that there were tears streaming from her eyes.  
  
That's when Becky saw Sue Snell enter, hiding behind the stage, watching happily, seeing that Tommy and Carrie had been nominated King and Queen of the Prom. But did she see the rope? That rope concealed behind the lights?  
  
Becky saw it. She saw it jiggle a tiny bit.  
  
Becky followed behind, but not too close to Carrie and Tommy. She watched as they walked up the steps to the silvery starred thrones to be crowned.  
  
Becky felt colder...the steel and the bloody taste and smell got stronger. The red splash from the sky, what was it? Becky watched as her sister was crowned and handed a bouquet of pink roses. Everyone cheering became so quiet that they faded into nothing.  
  
Now, she heard soft voices...two voices: one masculine and one feminine. Coming from somewhere...but where? The rope...she saw it jiggling nervously beneath Sue's hand. Becky looked up and saw it...  
  
The steel bucket with the rope attached around it upon the beam.  
  
(it's a conspiracy!)  
  
Sue saw it too. The voices she heard were soft:  
  
"When are we gonna pull it?" said the masculine voice.  
  
"Be patient!" said the feminine voice.  
  
She did not recognize the masculine voice, but recognized the feminine voice. Chris!  
  
(sweet jesus!)  
  
Sue ran to the stairs and looked underneath and saw Chris and Billy beneath the stage. She watched as Miss Collins pulled Sue away...everything was inaudible.  
  
But something's wrong! Becky saw Sue's lips move.  
  
Miss Collins pulled her away from the stage dragging her out towards the doors to throw her out.  
  
Look, I'm gonna pull it! Billy's voice said, teasingly yanking the rope.  
  
Stop it! Chris said and SLAP! She slapped him across the face.  
  
The eye, the tongue, the trembling hands...Becky saw them again. They were Chris's. Just seeing all this, the room became hotter slowly. Becky heard the gym doors were about to close when Sue was being thrown out...  
  
(run becky! Save carrie! Run!)  
  
Becky ran to the stage and screamed:  
  
"CARRIE! LOOK OUT!"  
  
It was too late...the rope had been pulled and the bucket toppled down...and a red splash came down from the sky.  
  
From The Shadow and Flame Exploded (p. 22)  
  
It got both girls. Carrie got the worst of it all and Becky got some on her face and the front of her dress. The entire gym fell silent and the heat increased just slightly. The blood from the bucket make horrible dripping sounds and the clinks of the bucket as it swung from the ceiling.  
  
Carrie stood there, her eyes and mouth wide open with shock and speechless. Her crown had fallen off her bloody head and the blood dripped down, soaking her from head to toe, making her look like a brutally murdered corpse.  
  
Becky saw the first person to laugh was Norma Watson...no, she didn't laugh. She burst into laughter and pointed. Yet, it was still silent to Becky's ears.  
  
"What the hell..." Becky saw Tommy's lips move.  
  
The bucket fell, still dripping with blood and CLUNK! It hit Tommy on the head and he collapsed at Carrie's feet...he was dead.  
  
Now, it was Freddy's turn to laugh, then some more. Becky could hear the voices in Carrie's head.  
  
([they're all gonna laugh at you!]) Momma's voice echoed  
  
That's when the laughter grew louder.  
  
([plug it up, plug it up, plug it up]) the girls' voices began overlapping Momma's voice.  
  
The laughter got louder.  
  
([we're all sorry about this incident, cassie]) Mr. Morton.  
  
Louder.  
  
([trust me, carrie, you can trust me]) Miss Collins.  
  
The entire student body and faculty in images of a kaleidoscope, spinning with a mixture of laughing faces and voices, loud and confusing like a mad funhouse.  
  
([they're all gonna laugh at you, they're all gonna laugh at you! Plug it up, plug it up we're all sorry about this incident, cassie. Trust me, carrie, you can trust me])  
  
LAUGHTER, LAUGHTER...LOUDER, LOUDER, SPINNING FASTER AND FASTER...  
  
Becky could see that her sister had this look in her eyes, something that reminded Becky of a zombie-trance-like state.  
  
[Let's destroy them, Becky]  
  
(Conspirators burn in hell)  
  
She watched her bloody sister, her eyes got wider and her pupils dilated, her mouth thin. Then...  
  
Flex.  
  
Then, the west doors slammed shut.  
  
[Make it hot, Becky]  
  
The room jumped ten degrees from normal. Becky's blood shot from 98.9 to 104.0 degrees, her blood pressure jumped and her muscles went stiff and her black eyes went to slits and her pupils dilated.  
  
Flex.  
  
The south doors slammed shut.  
  
Flex.  
  
The east doors slammed shut.  
  
Flex.  
  
The lights turned a bloody red color.  
  
[Hotter, Becky, make it hotter than hell]  
  
(I will, carrie. I'll burn them all for you)  
  
The screams got loud as they ran to the doors. They were blocked. The pounding got louder in her head, giving her a splitting headache. Carrie and Becky stood there; both of them had bloody red war paint on their faces.  
  
(metal and heat...)  
  
People screamed when they touched the metal doors; they were burned with first-degree burns.  
  
[Burn them, Becky]  
  
Becky concentrated. The sweat dripped down her forehead and her palms became sweaty.  
  
(fire and cloth)  
  
Concentration... Concentration...  
  
(blue fire is the most dangerous)  
  
Then, several large blue flames erupted on some people. Some on skirts, some on pant cuffs, some on dinner jackets. They screamed, trying to put themselves out, but the blue flames spread.  
  
(fire and hairspray...)  
  
Then, some of the girls' hair burst into yellow flames, giving off a smell that smelt like burnt feathers doused with accelerant. They screamed as the fire ate their beautiful hair.  
  
Then, the fire hose came out slowly and the dial was turned up to full blast, spraying everyone in its path, standing up like a cobra. People screamed and fell over as the force of the water sprayed them.  
  
(heat and water)  
  
Becky concentrated on the hose as it sprayed people...she thought about how water boils beneath a hot stove. Now, there was steam coming from the water. People screamed as the hot water sprayed out, their skins turned a bloody red color.  
  
[Push, Becky, push really hard]  
  
Becky never pushed the push really hard. She had never tried it. It was so hot in the gym that the concrete walls of the gym and the floor were smoking a soft grey smoke. Seeing Norma, she pushed really hard.  
  
(this is for you, carrie)  
  
A fireball about the size of a soccer ball burst out with orangey and yellow flames, setting Norma's entire body on fire. She heard that high- pitched scream as she was consumed in the flames. Becky's head felt like it would split in two, but she didn't care. She wanted to burn them all. Concentrating on the stars, they burst into flames and fell on people that were under them.  
  
One of the teachers grabbed the out-of-control fire hose and tried to restrain it, but it sprayed towards the lights, sending bright white sparks and the loud crackles fell from the sky like stars.  
  
(white heat...the hottest and the most dangerous)  
  
Becky concentrated and pushed harder. The little white sparks from the lights soon shot across the gym like bullets firing from a machine gun. People screamed and their formal wear, hair, and skin were burned.  
  
Miss Collins and four other students trying to get out. Somehow she got separated and Becky watched as the scoreboard fell from the ceiling, slamming into Miss Collins. She squirmed like a bug and there was a low buzz. Becky smelled the sweet, burnt flesh. It reminded her of sweet, burnt ham and she could taste it on her dry tongue through her nose.  
  
She could also see Chris and Billy watching through the window in horror.  
  
[We'll get them later, Becky]  
  
(I know we will, sister 'cause conspirators burn in hell)  
  
"Give me the mic!" said Mr. Morton.  
  
"No! Give me the mic!" said Mr. Fromm.  
  
"I'm the one who's in charge!"  
  
Becky saw that they were fighting over the microphone to calm everyone down.  
  
"Everyone please stay calm..."  
  
(heat and metal)  
  
[water and electric]  
  
The hose went towards the stage and sprayed. White sparks burst out and there was a loud buzzing sound and the smell of burnt flesh. Becky watched as Mr. Morton collapsed on the stage, he was dead with his eyes wide open in surprise. Becky saw Mr. Fromm fall from the stage into the electric wires.  
  
(never play with fire)  
  
Becky always wanted to burn Mr. Fromm for mocking Carrie. She pushed really hard and another fireball with yellow and white flames burst out. She listened as he screamed as he was consumed in the flames. Now the entire mural was on fire and spread rapidly in beautiful yellow and orange flames.  
  
[burn them all, Becky turn them to ash leave no witnesses]  
  
Becky concentrated really hard.  
  
PUSH!  
  
Several fireballs shot at people with red-hot, white flames like homing missiles and some people burst into flames themselves. People screamed as they were cremated in the heat of flames, running as the licking flames consumed them, dropping like flies. Then, flames burst through the concrete and the glass burst from the windows; the heat was so intense that it could burn concrete and break glass.  
  
Both girls left Bates High School in burning flames. 


	11. Chapter 3

Chapter III

From _The Shadow and Flame Exploded_ (p. 28)

The fire engines roared down the street and Carrie and Becky walked, both barefooted and with bloody war painted faces, stiff, and in trance like states.

(never play with fire)

Becky saw that they had arrived at the burning school. She wanted to make it extremely hot so that the whole building would be in flames.

(flashover…the most dangerous of all fires)

Becky had read about flashovers, that was when fire reached 932 degrees Fahrenheit (500 degrees Celsius) and when you add oxygen, like opening a door for instance, smoke will burst into flame. The smoke detectors inside beeped loudly, fire alarms screamed…the firemen tried to open the doors, but they were locked. They took out battering rams and axes and began to chop down the doors; the smoke seeped under the door and sucked back in…the door opened and the explosion threw the firemen three, four meters back.

Then, she heard a car approaching…very fast. Becky could see them. Chris's eyes wide, licking her lips on her pretty face.

(I'd like to burn those pretty lips of yours, chris)

45 miles per hour, then 50, then 60, it drove.

(carrie, the car)

(_I know, sister_)

Carrie and Becky turned, seeing the car. The car seemed to have swerved and missed both girls and it flipped about ten times. There were terrified screams as the car flipped. Once it was back on the wheels, she smelt gas…horrible smelling gas…

(gas and fire)

Becky pushed hard with all her force, her head ready to explode and…

(remember chris, fire kills)

A fireball with orangey yellow flames came charging towards the car and it exploded into pieces.

They walked down Carlin Street, both tired and heads throbbing with a headache. Becky was soaked in a hot sweat as they approached their house.

"Becky?" said Carrie's voice.

"What?"

"I…what happened?"

"I don't know. I can't remember anything!"

"Neither can I? What did we do?"

They walked up the steps towards their house and opened the door to the sad bungalow. Inside there were thousands of candles all over: in the kitchen, in the living room, all over. They glowed with a soft yellow flame, making the place seem like a church.

They found the stairs to their room and found candles on each step. They walked up the stairs; there was no sign of Momma…

(I feel her presence in the room)

They went to the bathroom and Carrie turned the water on in the tub. Becky heard the zipper of her dress and watched as her bloody panties were stepped out of. Her sister got in the tub; the water turned a bloody color as soon as she stepped in.

Becky remembered the time she and her sister bathed together as children. She too stripped off her dress, covered in sweat and stepped in the bloody bath, naked.

Becky washed her sister. Blood caked on her thin fingers as she washed her hair. She went from her hair to her shoulders to back to breasts to legs, feeling that smooth skin.

Carrie took the soap from Becky and washed her sweaty, pale skin. Becky enjoyed her sister's hands washing her, remembering how long ago it was when Carrie bathed her. The gentle movements of her hands, the soap on her body, the water being poured onto her. She liked it.

"Sing to me, Becky…" Carrie whispered, still in tears.

Becky remembered a song in a haunting voice equivalent to a child's:

Round we go, the world is spinning. When it stops, it's just beginning. Sun goes up, we all sigh. Sun goes down, then we die…

Becky felt weak and sick inside. They all laughed at her sister and her and now they were dead…dead and gone; now the world is quiet.

(sun went down, they all died)

After Carrie and Becky had their bath, they dried themselves and put on clean nightgowns. Becky pulled on her ugly green woolen robe, her blood feeling cold. She saw something in the back of her mind: a bloody knife.

(momma's here)

"Momma?" called Carrie, like a child in the dark.

(don't call her, carrie)

Momma came out of the shadows from behind the bathroom door, dressed in a silk nightgown; Becky could see her swollen breasts with taut nipples showing through the material. Becky and Carrie wept quietly. She hugged her two daughters.

"Oh, Momma!" Carrie cried. "It was bad. They all laughed at me."

"And me too," Becky sobbed.

Momma knelt at her knees, holding the girls' hands.

"Hold us, Momma," Becky said.

"I should've killed myself when he put it in me," she said clearly. "As you said, Rebecca, you were right. We did it the first time before we were married, but then after that he promised never again. Never again. But sin never dies. Sin never dies."  
(slut slut slut slut…) Becky voice singing in the tune of 'Twisted Nerve' echoed in Momma's head.

"At first it was all right. We lived sinlessly. We slept in the same bed, but we never did it." Becky watched her eyes grow wide. "And then, that night, I could see him looking at me that way. We got down on our knees to pray for strength and he…touched me. In that place, that woman place. I sent him out for a few hours. He came home with whiskey on his breath…"

"Momma, be quiet," Becky said quietly.

"And he took me. And I liked it…" her voice was laughing now, head thrown back full of ecstasy. "I _liked_ it. Those dirty hands touching me all over."

"Momma, stop it!" Becky said; the heat began to intensify and the candles melted faster. "You're _sick!_"

"Then…after you were born, Carrie…we swore never again. I should've given you up to God when you were born. Then, he came home again on that night, drunk and angry. Threw me on the bed, ripped my nightgown to shreds…he took me again…o god! He was so rough when he did it…I liked it even more…his mouth all over me…"

"Momma, shut up!" Becky whispered.

"I liked it when he was so rough with me…so hard and rough. Then, I carried you, Rebecca. When you were born, you were Satan's own image…sickly, ugly with his black eyes. I should've given you up to God when you were born…now, the devils have come home."

Becky said nothing, but the heat went up slowly. She had enough being called 'Satan's child'.

(I hate you)

"We'll pray, Carrie and Becky," she said, her voice high, yet soft.

"Yes, Momma," they said quietly.

"For the last time, we'll pray."

The girls pressed their heads against Momma's bosom; Becky's head pressed against a large breast; it was warm and soft, her finger brushed her nipple beneath the smooth silk, it was hard and stiff.

(you suckled me there, momma yet your milk sour as gall and lethal as poison)

I did, beck, I did

"We'll pray," she said again, stroking the girls' hair.

"Our Father…" Momma began.

"Who art in heaven…" Becky said.

"Hallowed be thy name," said Momma.

"Thy kingdom come…" Carrie said.

"Thy will be done…" Momma said.

Then, Becky saw the knife raised above Carrie's head.

"NO!" she screamed

Momma leaned forward and the knife came down fast in a shining arc on Carrie and she shrieked and fell down the stairs.

"You cunt!" Becky screeched.

"All I ever wanted was you and your sister, Rebecca…" Momma said softly.

She wrestled her on the floor, her head just at the edge of the stairs, ready to stab her in the throat. Blood began to ooze from around the handle and drip onto Becky's neck like cold droplets of water. With all the strength she had, grabbed Momma's strong wrist; she could feel the bone and blood in her veins hot and hard against her own hand and the knife hovered over her neck.

With her free hand, Becky grabbed the front Momma's nightgown and ripped it open, exposing her breasts. The breasts had grown swollen and the nipples were pink circles, hard and rough, puckering outward.  
The heat intensified faster, Becky's head was ready to split as she thought about fire…her fire…

(don't play with fire, momma…it burns)

The blade scrapped Becky's shoulder…she ignored the pain and grabbed Momma's left breast. Momma screamed and bloody milk sprayed from her nipple onto Becky's face…it felt scalding hot and there was a white handprint with red around the outside. She tasted the hot milk and it was sour.

(like gall)

"I've always waited for this moment, Rebecca Anne, nearly sixteen years," said Momma. "The day you would die. And in the soon future, the Lord will bless me for expiating you and your sister and send you two back where you belong: in Satan's palace."

"Bitch," Becky whispered between her teeth. "You don't have a future."

Momma pushed her down the stairs. She tumbled, her brain liquefying inside her skull as it bumped against the twisted wooden steps.

Momma came down the stairs, her nightgown ripped open, breasts leaking bloody milk, and both had tiny red handprints. The knife was bloody and her face with a dreamy look, making the sign of the cross over the girls. They crawled to the kitchen towards the door, trying to get away from the madwoman. Carrie grabbed the doorknob and tried to open it.

(locked)

Momma came closer, her face looked as if she were living in a fantasy world, and the knife raised above her head, ready to deliver the final blow…then, a knife came flying and hit her on target in the hand that was holding the knife. She gasped with pain. Then, an apple peeler with the apples in the left breast, next a fork from the sink in the right breast, then a cake knife in the liver area, then a butter knife below the left breast and lastly…

Becky communicated with Momma telepathically:

(I can see your heart, momma it's a big red muscle)

what about my heart, rebecca

(mine becomes hot and beats fast when I use my powers now you'll know what it's like to be me)

O GOD!

Becky could see Momma's heart beating faster and heat coming from all sides.

(see, momma? my blood becomes hotter feel how hot your heart is?)

I do

(doesn't it feel like it's burning? Being consumed in flames?)

Soon, Momma screamed. Beck saw a hole formed between her breasts and a heart beating faster with smoke coming out. Soon, the beating heart burst into flames. Momma screamed even more as it burned. Soon, a fork flew across the room, impaling her between the breasts, right into the burning heart. The girls watched the blood trickle down onto her white gown, both her nipples and her body.

Momma, her head thrown back, crying with pain and ecstasy, a grin spread across her face, her eyes wide open. Becky looked at Carrie, in a corner, terrified about what she had done. The cries from Momma lasted for nearly five minutes and then, her head bowed to the left and the fiery heart came to a stop. Soon all was quiet.

(we killed her)

Becky watched as the blood trickled down onto her white gown, her naked breasts exposed and bleeding. Her eyes were wide open and her mouth seemed to be smiling. But her heart was gone…nothing but ash.

(sweet jesus)

Carrie and Becky got up. They walked away.

From _The Medical Files of Rebecca White_ (p. 44)

Sue drove down Carlin Street, in total shock about what happened that night. In that high school gym, over 209 people were dead, absolutely no survivors. No investigator could explain how the fire started exactly for there was no accelerant, no matches, no electrical fire, nothing. It was indeed a great mystery how the fire exactly started and how some people were burned to death.

Sue walked past the White bungalow. The house was glowing softly with candlelight and seemed quiet. Where were Becky and Carrie?

She saw two figures: one was kneeling, cradling a body in her arms and the other lay in her arms. She saw it was Becky, her nightgown drenched in blood, rocking her sister who stared up at her, dying. She gripped her hand tightly.

"Carrie, don't…" Becky said. "Hold onto me."

"I'm leaving this world, Beck," she said.

"You can't!" she said. "You cared for me. I'll be lost."

"And you to me. And you won't be."

"Please…" Becky sobbed. "Please, Carrie…don't leave me alone."

"I'm sorry, Becky…sometimes, you have to learn to let go."

She felt tears prick her eyes. She sobbed quietly, her body trembling.

"I love you, " she managed to say. "Beck…"

There was a rattle in the back of Carrie's throat. Her body went stiff and her hand was still grasping tightly onto Becky's hand, cold and stiff with rigor mortis and blood spilt out of her mouth and onto her Becky's white nightgown. Tears formed in her ebony orbs.

"I love you," she sobbed into Carrie's hair.

She let out a loud series of sobs that echoed all over Chamberlain.

"Becky?" said a voice.

Becky heard the soft voice of Sue Snell.

"What are you doing here?" asked Sue.

"Shhh," said Becky. "I'm caring for Carrie." Becky began to sing: "Round we go the world is spinning, when it stops, it's just beginning…"

The song echoed throughout Chamberlain…and voices echoed in her head:

They're all gonna laugh at you… 

_Plug it up, plug it up plug it up…_

_We're all so sorry about this incident, Cassie…_

_Trust me, Carrie, you can trust me…_

The voices mingled with laughter, loud and chaotic that Becky could've sworn she nearly made the push come out.

From _Interview with Rebecca A. White_ (p. 30)written by Detective John Mulchaey

"Carrie died in my very arms. They questioned me about my sister's murder. I ended up in the psycho hospital," Becky said. "I remember it all like the back of my hand. The shower. The prom. The night after. Everything. Funeral for all the dead students was a few weeks later."

I stared at Becky with shock and wonder, how such a young girl would remember the past.

"How did you end up here?" I asked.

Becky sighed. "Sue Snell found me with Carrie's body. My nightgown was all bloody. They thought I killed Carrie, but I was proved innocent. Sue had me spend the night at her house, I heard those voices from Prom Night…I went insane. They sent me to the chronic ward."

"How about Sue? Do you remember the last time you saw her?"

"The last time I heard from Sue Snell was her mother had found her in a shocked state. They're planning to leave because…well, the trauma was a bit harsh on her. She came to visit me the other day, telling me she had a dream about my sister's bloody hand reaching up and grabbing her. She experienced this dream three times, she told me. She too went to the institution, not here, but in the city."

"I'm sorry to interrupt," said the nurse, opening the door. "But visiting hours are over."

"Thank you, nurse," I said. "Thank you, Becky."

Becky got up and went back to the barred window. She heard the clicks of the lights as they turned off and the locks of the door slam shut.

We revealed Rebecca White's testimony in court…the story never came to a full conclusion on what exactly happened on Prom Night or how Mrs. White was killed. It all seemed impossible and beyond the theories of physics. The case was left unsolved.

Rebecca White was released from Chamberlain Psychiatric Hospital. She was last seen visiting where the White bungalow still stands. The white sign that said 'For Sale' had written in black paint: CARRIE WHITE BURNS IN HELL! Below that, it read: YOU'LL BE NEXT, BECKY WHITE! There was a skull below it with cross bones and X-ed eyes.

I went to the White bungalow and found everything disturbed. Religious pictures were knocked over, crosses broken, chairs and tables turned over. I went to the girls' room. There were fresh roses in front of a statue of the Virgin Mary in the corner. I found on the wall in blood:  
CARRIE + BECKY WERE HERE

I hear the haunting tune of Bernard Hermann's 'Twisted Nerve' echoing inside the White bungalow.

Some say she committed suicide. I checked all the death certificates, nothing showed up. Some say she left Chamberlain and changed her name, in fear of the government finding out about her and her sister and their powers. I checked the Witness Protection Program, no one under that name had changed their name since the date of her release at Chamberlain County Psychiatric.

Some say she was transferred to another mental institution in a different county or state. I had checked every mental institution in the county of Maine or other states, but every one said that no one had a patient under that name.

We sent out missing reports all over the news to find her, but no one claimed to see a girl that matched her description. Whatever it is that happened to her, no one knows where she is or what happened to her…

Rebecca A. White is missing…


End file.
